later, we will discuss the latest of bed on why comprehensive reform is not a good strategy "washington journal" is next. ♪ ♪ host: in an interview with bloomberg television, the former fed chairman alan greenspan says that bush tax cuts should expire. british prime minister david cameron plans to defend bp in his visit to washington next week and louisiana governor bobby jindal says the moratorium on oil drilling does great harm to citizens of louisiana and beyond. we will take that for our first 45 minutes and get sure thoughts and oil drilling, the band that is currently in place by the

government and governor jindal's thoughts on the harm it does to the economy and what he says is our dependence on foreign oil. the numbers are on your screen.

host: he said the moratorium causes damage to many families. it risks killing 20,000 more jobs and close result in $135 million in wages each month. to make sure that disaster does not happen again, there should be specific reviews for oil rigs. federal officials appear more interested in ideology and scoring political points as they have done with the misguided cap and trade legislation at the expense of americans who derive their livelihood from the energy

industry. let's be clear, this moratorium will do nothing to clean up the gulf of mexico and it has already done harm to many hard- working citizens. the effects will extend far beyond louisiana's. america has already lost two oil rigs to foreign countries. more oil drilling companies are negotiating as we speak. again, this is in ""the washington post." carrollton, georgia is up first on the question of the drilling ban this is our democrats lied. what do you think? caller: i think president obama

is doing the right thing. the only think i think he is doing wrong is letting them -- may be letting them try to get the oil up out of there. it is sealed off now and it needs to remain that way. host: as far as a ban on drilling, can you go farther in your thoughts in light of governor jindal's thoughts. ? caller: it is very obvious that bp is a company that cannot be trusted. all these other oil drilling things out there probably they've got problems that we don't even know about and i think what is going on is president obama is trying to get

the scientists to find out whether or not these other oil rigs -- are they going to explode, too? this is not just about the gulf. i live in georgia hundreds of miles away. disaffecting our whole country. host: off of twitter this morning -- how many oil rigs are in the gulf and how many are proven safe? columbus, ohio, are independent , good morning. caller: there are 27,000 oil rigs. how come the dumb americans did not know about this? all this is coming out now after april 20. i wish you fellas would bring out the major compliance against oil companies.

97% of them are bp and i wish you guys would do something about what the civil engineers brought out. it would take $10 trillion to bring the infrastructure in this country up to eight d--- up to a d-. host: before you go, let me ask you a question. what about the drilling ban? caller: absolutely, how many of these drilling rigs have the safety precautions that the one that has been spilling for a 80- some days did not have. we did not even have that. >host: what about the economy?

caller: governor jindal wants to run for president, let's face it. this is all political. host: new york, new york, on our independent line, go ahead caller: no more drilling oil. it is time to turn this ship around and transition to electric cars. we have the technology. think of the economic possibilities. manufacturing electric cars within the 48 states of the united states, developing the technology, 100% of the parts from factories within the 48 states, taxing any attempt at importation of electric car parts, incredibly taxing, strongly taxing imports on electric car parts from outside the united states. lastly, there is no way in hell

that wealthy americans, rich americans, the most well off people in this country are going to be developing and spurring on business and investment in this country by keeping them at a 35% vs. a 39.5% tax bracket. anybody that thinks that wealthy americans are going to be investing in the stock market's, they will take their global vacations, they spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on their families and themselves on vacations. the rich should be taxed at 45%. thank you for cspan. host: we drifted a little from the drilling idea but it gave a segue to ""the new york times." confidence is ebbing. the economic recovery has been helped by the spending and the

rich are tightening their belts for the highest income households started spending comparably well other consumers held back but their confidence has ebbed according to retail sales report and economic analysis. one reason is that high and consumers have become more jittery and cautious. that cautious attitude seems in part of concerns about global stability in europe and the volatility of the stock market in recent months. the major stock indexes fell sharply friday after several companies announced the disappearing earnings. bank stocks were the biggest losers. it goes on but it talks about what they label as the wealthy and their influence in an economy. back to our thoughts on the drilling issue. governor jindal in an op ed says

that the drilling ban on deepwater drilling would add insult to injury to what is already going on in that state. your thoughts, lisle, ill., independent line, good morning. caller: i guess i am a firm believer that it would be ignorant to allow the drilling. i think the economy is already in such poor shape. we only have one motion. we only have one beach. there are some many resources that can be damaged. we don't know how we can fix this now. they said there are -- so many that have not been checked as far as whether this could happen again. i previously was a republican

and have switched to an independent. i am appalled when i hear republicans say that this is a good decision. let's gosealed and ahead and start killing again. it is the large catastrophe we have had again. -- we have had to the coast and the animals that have died. i think we have to come up -- even though it will not be a popular thing -- i realize it is hurting the jobs, too, but, i don't think there is any other choice that can be made. host: of twitter -- of course,

it is doing great harm. they are not out there drilling for

guest: this is somewhere north of and the numbers have been strong. people ask in politics, much in need to win an election. i always said as much as we can raise. you never know what the circumstances will be. our biggest challenge will be allocation. we have so many competitive races. host: they talked about senator

byrd's special election. that is a discussion that takes place twice tomorrow morning. back to calls, our republican line, ohio, go ahead. caller: cuba and mexico are part of the gulf of mexico. q. but -- cuba is going with china and china wants to drill in the gulf of mexico and they would have lot less innovations in drilling then we demand. host: twitter -- a moratorium is a good idea. temple, texas, on our line for

democrats, good morning. caller: i think governor jindal is in the wrong. he just grandstands' all the time. the moratorium is a good thing and i think it should be enforced. it is only those oil rigs. i hear people calling about using oil. that oil goes overseas. we don't even get the benefit of our own oil in the united states. i think they should rethink the way they are talking. it is a wrong decision in my view. host: tell me one reason why it is a good thing. caller: it is unsafe and they only took what the oil companies said. until they could make it more safe, they should have a moratorium on especially the deep water wells where they cannot get down there and do any work on it.

they have a concrete base at the hall. i think the band is good and the deep water wells and they should keep that up. i think obama is doing the best he can with what he has been given. host: the washington post" has a profile on governor scott brown. he has turned into an unpredictable clockmaker. -- lawmaker. he is the third member of the troika that includes olympia snowe and senator, is pretty often breaks with the other 38

members of the senate. people praise and condemn him. there are three names that rise to the forefront in the consumer protection agency. it is harvard law school professor elizabeth warren. treasury department secretary michael barr. gene kimmelman. kress, from jackson, mississippi, thanks for waiting. go ahead.

"caller: my kids came from the oilfields. i am worried about the future of the people that will come after us. they should not have been there in the first place. if you have the equipment to keep from causing a disaster, they should not have been out there in the first place for the governor and the oil companies should be held liable and shut down. we are talking about millions and millions of lives. we are talking about our ecosystem. it does not matter -- find something else to do. find another job. people go through that all the time. as far as who's fault is, it is all of their fault. these people eat lunch and

dinner together. it is a soap opera. they are all involved. nobody should take full blame. most people don't pay attention to what is going on in the world except to watch 50 minutes of it on the news before they go to work. they don't actually know what is going on they can say it is anyone's fault. bp should not have been out there without a cap to go for that oil wells. host: manchester, maryland, republican line, bill. caller: i know a bit about the problems. i have been in the business 42 years as a scientist. this has been a shift of offals with obama leading the way. i have been a consultant to

u.s. domestic oil companies and foreign oil companies. in environmental and safety matters. i will say that american companies run to a higher standard on environmental and higher standard on safety. that is a fact because i have worked for both of them. this whole thing should not have happened in the first place, but there are thousands and thousands of oil rigs operating in the gulf safely and without problems. it is completely inappropriate for an experience and on educated government official to come in and of -- and presumably to have all the answers because they don't. the biggest problem is that there is high regulation but for the most part the regulators don't understand what they are looking at and don't know what they are doing. i have been there, done that,

seen that, and i shake my head at out incompetents the government regulators are. that is what i have to say. host: the lead story in "the los angeles times" --

it goes on and you can reap more in ""the los angeles times." are democrats line is next. caller: one of the things i would like to see is get somebody on c-span that understands petroleum. the word is always oil but petroleum is much more of an

oil. some things we don't understand is that gasoline is a byproduct. we have to use it in cars because we have to. petroleum has more of a purpose to it. host: you are breaking up and i apologize. off of twitter -- there is no way to ensure this will never happen again. anyone who says we can is lying. texas, on our republican line. caller: morning, pedro. i heard this fellow from texas that was on earlier complaining about bobby jindal. apparently he messed the program i saw an cspan a couple of weeks ago where there was a lady on there who is very familiar with the situation and she explant that the moratorium

that was put on has put thousands of people out of work. these are people who are working on oil drilling rigs. do you recall if that guy called from austin, texas? host: i don't, i am sorry. champaign, ill., independent line. caller: i think it is easy for people who don't live there. this will not affect their mortgage and their ability to continue their lives. it is easy for us to say it is dangerous and you should stop. if this had not happened, things would keep going on the way they have for years. we have too many middle managers and less people on the ground inspecting these places anyway. you do not have enough people to tell you -- i don't think they

have enough people who really know what they're looking at, people who have worked on oil rigs all their lives who know what is going on. you can only learn from working there for years. anyway, i think the moratorium is a good idea and concept, but it is just not practical. i feel really sorry for those people in louisiana. i have watched them on your show speaking with the the special committee. they want the government to get out of the way and let them and bp fix this problem. after what the winter with hurricane katrina and the economic situation, this is their year to make up that money. the government to get out of the way and let them handle it. host: you may be just joining us -- we will talk about the legislative races and how redistricting impacts this.

fj$gñto finish off the program,e topic of comprehensive reform. we have a guest from the new america foundation and the road a piece about comprehensive reform. it looks at health care and immigration and the comprehensive report and talks about all of that. that is coming up in the next two hours or so. if you watch this program every 30 days, we ask that you call or hold off for 30 days. georgia, hello. caller: i love cspan. i am now part of the joe ccutcheon show.

i will talk about what bobby jindal is calling for. i agree with him. allegheny is the main show. this is the army of people that support drilling. we have to go with bobby jindal. we are electing people like tom grey, good people but it is real exciting and we areo!♪y buildinn army of people in the georgia area. we hope to take it national. we all support cspan. i am all for bobby jindal. these democrat policies are running the country. we need less government, less taxes, and less regulation and that is what bobby jindal is talking about. i am fired up. host: legislative races will be the topic for the next 45 minutes.

our guest is lou jacobson. we will pick up that discussion next. >> this weekend on both tv, the harlem book fair. there'll be topics on religion, human rights, diversity and publishing, and african-american history. that is live all day saturday started at 11:00 a.m. eastern. also the impact of ayn rand. columbia university professor alan brinkley on his new book on

henry loos and the reinvention of the magazine industry. that is on c-span 2. for the complete schedule, go to book tv.org. >> the senate judiciary committee will vote on tuesday for the nomination of elena kagan. learn more about the nation's highest court. you can get cspan's latest book available in hardcover and as an ebook. >> "washington journal" continues. host:lou jacobson is here to talk about state races. why should people at large pay attention to this? guest: certainly, a big factor coming up is that something has

to be done now. the census will change seats in congress. it will be drawn by all of these -- newlines will be drawn. this will be based on who controls the senate, the state house, and the governorship. this will affect show congress operates for the next four years. host: as far as the way you look at this, what is happening on these state legislative races as far as the inkling you get from what will end up? guest: the democrats have done pretty well. they are at a relative high point.

they control a majority of the state houses. they have done pretty well. there are a couple of factors going against democrats. historically, in terms of the midterm election, the party controls the white house, since 1900, they have gained seats only twice and lost five times. the second factor is that this year is a wave year for the gop. you see this in -- you see this in the senate and the u.s. house. in terms of presidential approval being down quite a bit in the past year-and-a-half. you also see it in the

governors' races. there is a lot of answers out there. --angst out there. shortly after watergate, about 20 chambers were lost by the gop. in 1994, the democrats lost about 21 chambers when bill clinton was elected. it could be shaping up to be the kind of year. it might not be. we're still a ways from the election, but there is a pattern. in a normal year, the gop would look to gain seats but they could gain more than normal. host: 2 financial regulations play out on a state level? guest: certainly, national and

state to test based are factors. think of the general mood of the country and that tends to be driven by national factors. that is in terms of foreign policy and war and so forth. that does a lot to shape the general environment. on the other hand, there is also a lot of stayed-particular factors. -- state-the particular factors. in a normally uneventful year, those state factors are normally driving factors. for a wave election which this seems to be turning out to be, the national issues will play a bigger role. does not mean that state factors

are not a factor. it may make a big difference. state host: the elections is our topic for the next 45 minutes. you put together a survey looking at what is going on. here is the breakdown. it says as far as house chambers are concerned, currently those leaning democratic are colorado, delaware, michigan, minnesota, north carolina. you identify as tossups alabama, iowa, new hampshire, ohio, pennsylvania, wisconsin and identified as leaning republican alaska, indiana.

what is interesting to you to note in this? guest: i have meant doing this project for the past 10 years. i have a decent background on this. two things jump out it may. one is the sheer number of chambers in play. this is tied to the highest number in past years. it ties with 2002 which came at the end of the cycle. the pattern historically is that fewer chambers start out in play and as time goes on and people pay attention, more go into play. if we start at the highest level, it will probably go up. 31% of chambers are up this year and they are seen to be in play. i would think that would go up by a few percentage points and

maybe more. at the same time, some of the chambers that lean democratic might switch. it might go the other direction. the sheer number is a big deal. a bigger deal than that is the breakdown in the chambers which are up and are competitive. during the past five cycles, the chambers that are up have been split about 50-50 for any given time in the cycle between democratic-held chamfers and republican-held chambers. there are different variations. this cycle so far, there are 21 democratic chambers that are in play and only four gop chambers in play. i have never seen that before.

for the past five cycles, that is something new. host: let's look at the senate chambers about possible majorities. colorado, iowa, maine, nev., and north carolina are gop and tossups are alabama, alaska, new york, wisconsin -- leaning republican, montana. guest: one factor that is interesting is if you look at the tossups, i believe 10410 are held by democrats. -- i believe 10 for 10 are held by democrats which is different than recent years. in an environment where state factors are the most important, you might see those split 50-50.

what you see any strong wave election where a single party is doing well and the other is not, you might see breaks for the same party instead of splitting 50-50. that is the risk to democrats, these tossup chambers. there are a couple of factors for the democrats. quite a lot of the democratic- leaning chambers are democratic- held chambers. they could lose those but for right now, the democrats are favored. it does not mean they will finish up that way but if they can hold onto the chamber as they currently control this could probably be a less than historic year of changes for them.

if the democrats continue to spiral downward, it could be on par with 1974 or 1994. host: garland, texas, democratic line. caller: i am from texas and i was wondering what role would gerrymandering plighplay. what about where they cut the lines of the district? are you talking about the mood of the country because of jobs? people may vote republican just because of the economy right

now. my comment is that the job situation where obama gave the stimulus to the banks reminds me of what happened when the iranian held the hostages with jimmy carter. after the election, ronald reagan won the election. [unintelligible] may be the same thing will happen with this election. k:3mgguest: in terms of the gerrymandering, there are seven or eight states that are on a bipartisan state basis. they are single district states. and most of the other states, generally what happens and there are variations but what happens generally is that the state

house and senate will do a plan and passive and the governor will sign it. the oild saw is that gerrymandering allowed politicians to choose their base. it can be very frustrating. this is a very complicated and obscure stuff. it is frequently hard to get the voters to focus on this. it is a very inside political thing. there is a long history of the politicians drawing lines to benefit themselves, their party. we will certainly see that. that is why some many of these state house and senate races are important because they will be drawing the lines for the next 10 years for congress and the

state house themselves. host: she asked about the impact of the job situation and how it plays out on the local level. guest: in terms of a wave election, there is a national mood. jobs is the main issue as well as the economy. that is fundamentally a national issue. it does not mean there is no role for the state but usually when you talk about state issues driving the voters in the state, you're talking about state budgets and services and so forth and schools. people, i think, understand that the president and congress are working for the larger economy. when this is a big deal right now, the economy, people will be thinking about the national picture.

that said, there are many states where it is complicated because maybe even though the democrats control congress and the presidency, you also have some states with the gop controlling all three branches in the state. that is a variable which various state by state. . .

it will be interesting to watch this year whether you will see the voters sort of picking and choosing carefully which incumbents they are trying to throw out. you know, in california, as the caller said, will the voters choose to throw out the g.o.p. from the govership and have jerry brown democrat installed. at the same time as they throw out barbara boxer, who perhaps the democratic u.s. senator. or, will they all change to be g.o.p. victors. it's a good question. we just don't know the answer. >> how many governships are at

play? >> i haven't looked at that. there are 36 seats up and quite a lot of them are competitive. i would say only a handful are truly safe for one party or the other. i haven't looked at the breakdown into the party shifts yet but i probably will at a later point. but it's a very volatile year. going back to that 2002 year, we are eight years after that so we've had a chance for folks who won in 2002 as the opposite party in a sense in a lot of these states, they are done, they are at the end of this year, and these are totally open seats. you will likely see states like kansas, oklahoma, wyoming, states which have had democratic gover no, sir, albeit conservative democratic governors for the most part or certainly moderate leave and have the goop take over. you'll probably see the flip side happen in places like

rhode island and i think also hawaii is another state strongly democratic states, connecticut as well, which should be governed by democrats probably revert to that this year. and those are factors which really have very little to do with the national scene other than just general frustration with the folks in charge. host: ohio on our democrats line. go ahead. caller: good morning. i appreciate sir, i have a question for mr. jacobson. why are the state lurs legislatures across the country in this mode or directive from the mupet mr. michael steele at the rnc, to block all stimulus and block all construction

towards jobs? in particular $400 million of d.o.t. transportation funds from f.r.a. have been directed to ohio. i'm calling from the 12th district. there's been blockage at the controlling board by an apparatus set up by the republicans and their obstructionist techniques to have all d.o.t. funding have to go through a seven-man panel. it's become a block of mind set that it shouldn't be and in an apparatus of theatrical it should be technical for what's best for the country.

>> i think it's been too big, hasn't done enough. i would just say that in terms of political games being played, you know, certainly congress does it and the states are not different. again, each state has its own political games, the g.o.p. and the democrats depending on the circumstance will use policies to advance their parties' interest. it's not something new but it does happen both on the national and state level. host: what's the role of the independents in these races? >> well, in terms of the candidates there are some independents, although not so many. we are seeing a lot of action in the tea party and that's one of the things which could help the democrats potentially in that some of the tea party candidates could split the g.o.p. vote. and, therefore, allow the

democrats to win. no guarantee of that happening. but it certainly is a possibility out there. there are not too many of the chambers which i looked at that have a major third-party component. maine is probably one where there have been some third-party sometimes green candidates on the left who have been a factor, certainly a small block of third-party candidates could serve to hold the balance of power in certainly chambers. but the vast, vast majority are either d or r. host: you talked about snev with senator reid's son, saying it might help him in the end. guest: i mean, there are certainly a lot of states where this could happen. i actually was down in florida

to do a piece on a congressional seat where it's totally open, g.o.p. held seat in a somewhat competitive district where i think obama lost by about 4,000 votes and there is a very interesting candidate who is on the tea party line who is very strong in terms of fiscal conservative issues, low taxes, low spending, but he also has some fairly unusual views, such as being skeptical of drilling in the gulf and being skeptical of the iraq and afghanistan wars. and in a fairly quiet race, and by the way, he has won a couple terms countywide, he could theoretically draw from both sides and put that contest into contension. host: troy, michigan go ahead on our independent line. caller: yes.

thank you for c-span. you know, i was asked a question why the polesters and i told them zwrust opposite of what i was thinking because it was none of his business, you know. and i think that you guys, you ask so many silly questions. i mean, we have a great president who has accomplished more meaningful legislation than roosevelt. i have never seen a president work so hard. he has an international approval rating up in the high 70s. the military he has an approval rating up in the high 70s. it is just here where cable seems to live. i mean, every day how can you have a polling on a daily basis? guest: you know, certainly

there are concerns about polling in terms of reaching voters who don't have a phone at home, who are cell phone only. you know, and certainly there are partisan polls that are biased. but i do think polling generally speaking with a few exceptions has a fairly good track record, and i can understand frustration having to take a call in the middle of dinner. but i think in general polling has served fairly well. host: if you talk about this the is the year, the state of the anti-incumbent, let's call it, do people on the state level depend on business and support from those on the national levels to help their campaign as much as in years past? guest: i think you'll see less of that. it depends district by district. if you are talking about congress there are some strongly democratic districts. you are seeing in the poll some

70, 80% range support for the president. but those are not the sorts of districts that are going to be especially competitive. the ones that are going to be competitive have like a lot of indbts in them, and -- independents in them and are sort of marginal. were fairly close in 2008. and because of the erosion of support through times from the president, you probably will not see too many endangered folks who are democrats trying to get elected again seek his support. you might. but probably if you do it will be fairly low key. host: little rock, arkansas up next on our democrat's line. caller: good morning. host: go ahead. caller: good morning. i wanted to make a comment first. i'm wondering about if people are really aware of what that the republicans have never, ever actually done anything for

america, anything good, only for the corporate people. and would like to just, i would like for you to have a program on the corporate welfare so weld no what's going on. i think the president is doing a very good job with what he has to work with. and i want to ask the gentleman there if he actually thinks that the american people would be stupid enough to put republicans back in power. thank you. guest: well, i'm not sure i can say that, but certainly if you look at the polls, if you get a sense of the voters' mood, they are definitely in an anti-incumbent mood. and right now the democrats control the senate and the house and the house. in recent history, you see that the voters have tended to want to have a body government especially since the 60's there's only been a couple

years where you've had unified government on the federal level. but if you look at the state level, you also have democrats controlling a decent majority of the govern norship, a majority of the state senate and state houses. so the risk for the democrats at this sort of historical point is great and these are very trying times economically and it's only natural that you will see voters take out their frustrations at the party in power. right now, the g.o.p. has very few spots of official power as the democrats do. host: so depending on how the elections go and redistricting happens, look ahead at what happens in 2012. guest: great question. you've got a president who right now looks certainly weaker than he did.

on the other hand, still in the high 40's. not in a crisis zone by sort of historical proportions. bush was down i think in the low 30's at the time he left office and for the final few years he served. so the president still has strong support from democrats, sinking support in terms of independents and very low support in terms of g.o.p. voters. on the other hand, i believe if you look at the polls he still probably the most trusted politician in america. that's part because he is so well known and the g.o.p. folks are not so well known. but he still has some good will even though he is very controversial in some quarters. he starts out as the biggest figure in politics in america, and it seems unlikely at this point that he will get some sort of primary challenge in

the democratic field. so it is really up to the g.o.p. to figure out who they run against him. and there are lots of people who will be campaigning for that. he starts out as the giant as all presidents do in the situation. host: our guest is a contributor to governing magazine, and if you want to see his work, check it out for yourself, you can see the front page there on the television screen. you talked about redistricting and what it did for 2010. let's turn a little bit then as far as the money is concerned. who are the organizations that are managing or at least providing money to these state representatives and how do they look financially? guest: definitely millions of dollars are going to be spent. there is a democratic legislative campaign committee, dlcc for short, they have

reported about $3.4 million raised so far in this cycle and they are strictly dealing with state senate candidates, state house candidates, push to win chambers. the g.o.p. equivalent is not truly equivalent because they have a much larger purview, that is the republican state leadership committee. and they basically include state senate and state house but also state ags, i think lieutenant governors and a few other things in there as well. so you can't certainly compare. they say that they plan to raise a total of $40 million over the course of the cycle. first of all, it hasn't happened yet, and they have a much larger purview. but these are the national groups that sort of send money to the stake capitals. now, that's separate from the snate senators and state reps who actually raise their own

money. there's certainly going to be a lot of money raised there, too. host: dage up next. caller: hi. this is fran and i'm calling from san diego and i would just like to say that these states are all crying about their debt, they're the ones that caused them. and san diego, we had to have legislatures that voted themselves 150% of their pay for retirement. have you ever heard of such an insane thing? i was luck kwli to get 50%. i'm 82 years old. i have never, never seen a congress that won't vote for anything the president presents to them. they are biased, they are purposefully not putting money into jobs because san diego turned down the president's stimulus bill to give them money and they were going to pay 08% had they employed new

personnel -- 80%. instead, they don't employ anybody unless they are working. so what does it tell you? it tells you they do not want to help the unemployed, just the employed. and that isn't what the stimulus is about. so they turned it down, and so san diego is suffering for it. i wish more people would listen to honest programs like yours and i thank god for c-span every day because they are they only listening to these radio people that don't know what they're talking about, like beck the other day described the president's wife as wearing a dress and she had a blouse on. guest: well, two thoughts. one is that state governments usually have a balanced budget rule. so states really have to try to make sure that their tax revenues are in line with their

spending. which means -- and that's not true for the federal government. so the federal government can go into debt, basically states can't. and that has been really the key place where states have run into trouble in recent years. most of the budget cuts have come because the states literally have to balance the budget in the way that the federal government doesn't. i guess the other thing is in terms of the politics of it all, part of the reason i think why the parties have been fighting each other so much over the past couple of cycles is that the margins are sort of historically close. it is less so in the senate and the house this year, but basically both parties feel that they could either win or lose control, and if that's the case, sort of personal partisan needs can rise over policy.

if you feel you're close enough to take over, if you block the other side then they sort of suffer from that. and we're not a situation where by sort of historical lels you look at the 1930s with certainly fdr had some very large minorities on the senate and the house where the party who is not in control had to really sort of deal with them and had no real chance to win in any -- and take over in any given year. now, in the past few cycles, they've been fairly close margins in congress and that just feeds into a partisan environment where a single party could feel that they can actually gain from being obstructionists. host: to jeff in oregon in a bit but joe from pennsylvania on our republican line, you're first. caller: good morning.

listening to your show, it's been a long time since i watched, maybe a couple of years and just tuned in today. and from what i'm hearing it's gotten progressively worse. i think your callers are listening to npr and c-span, they are watching c-span, because basically these are to enjoy government funding program rather than that reflective of free enterprise and free thought. host: we're not government-funded. caller: well, it's c-span, it's washington. and i know who is funding it. ok? and it is not us. secondly, this guy in michigan and these people who are -- and you yours, mr. jacobson who are extechnology the virtue offs president obama, it's clear where you stand. if you didn't read liberal fashism by goldberg then you probably think roosevelt was

the greatest president ever. quite frankly, what we have here is a population that is whose average intelligence is in decline and i'm caught between believing what the founders did and my fellow man and having faith in my fellow citizens to pull this country through no matter what times that we're in versus the decline in the average american intelligence. what i'm listening to the woman talking about the difference between a dress and a blouse, it's inain to listen to this show. host: winston, oregon up next. independents line. go ahead. caller: yes, i agree that there will be a house cleaning of incumbents in november, but i don't think things will change the minority and majority whip will pull the freshmen back into a room and say you vote the way i tell you to vote and americans will be celebrating

the house cleaning and there will be signs up on the major corners, we fired the crooks, but a year later in 2011, november, they'll see nothing has changed because the minority and majority whips will tell the freshmen, you vote the way i tell you to vote or you won't be on any subcommittees, you won't have any funds for your state, and you won't get reelected. and i think americans as the world depression worseance, their anger meetor will peg and i think you will see a third party in a presidential administration in 2012. guest: well, i'm not sure quite what to say. but -- should we take another

caller? host: michigan is up next. when you look at these things, you did a survey for governing magazine, did you travel to all these states in question? guest: i've done this now for five cycles. these are basically political experts in the states. they could be state journalists, state lobbyists, state lawmakers. and also speaking to the national experts as well who look at the states. i spoke to about roughly a hundred people, i think, and so obviously it's a large number of states. so it's certainly e-mail, phones, but these are people who i've had a good experience with in the past and i trust their judgment. and in general, my -- the

ratings i've done have been fairly accurate over time, so i think it's a pretty good -- it's not perfect. i know in the 2006 election where i usually do these around june, july, and then i do one in september and then one in october. in the 2006 election, where the g.o.p. fell out of control and the democrats took over the senate and the house, on the federal level, it was a real true wave election and i had to keep adding chambers to my list as time went on, two or three per week for the final couple of weeks. and i'm glad i did because all those flipped. host: governing magazine, governing.com the website, you can read for yourself. walter, thanks for waiting. go ahead. caller: hi.

all you've got to do is look at history. my god, you know, we've got to let these bush tax cuts go, and then we can develop some revenue for the country. and we have to invest in infrastructure is what we have to do. and it's pretty simple to me. and i think the president is doing a good job and i think that if we just give him a chance and let these bush tax cuts expire we're going to be all right. host: one more call, los angeles, california. james on our independent line. go ahead. caller: thank you for taking my call. i would just like to point out, there's an article out about the petraeus e-mails and how general petraeus might be running for president in 2012 if you go to america-high jack.com. it's titled at the very top nobody's covered this news in

washington. i wonder if your guest has heard about it. apparently a leading conservative had been basically plotting with general petraeus through private e-mails that i had access to and had been made available to mondayo wice blog. host: got your point and shot out there. any final thoughts? anything that we should look at that we haven't looked at yet? guest: i would just say that, in general, the mid-term elections are the ones where the most is at stake for the states. you have 36 governships that are being contested in the presidential year it's only about 10 or 12. so you have quite a lot at stake, as i said, 2002 eight years after that so there are a lot of open seats. and a lot of chance in terms of volatility. this is structural volt tilt, which is really separate from the political volatility we are seeing due to the state of the

economy and voter frustration. host: we appreciate your time. again, governing.com is the website and governing magazine is the site. coming up, food safety and legislation in the congress that deals with that and the impact financially nationwide. we'll take up that discussion in the minute. first, we'll look at the week's political news through the ink and paper of political cartoonists.

host: as promised, our guest,

he serves as the food and consumer product safety. we hear a lot about topics such as financial reform and what is going on in the gulf. as far as those topics are concerned, where does food safety and specifically legislation dealing with that fall into the mix? guest: it's very important for the food safety bill to go through the senate. it flew through the house almost a year ago with very broad bipartisan support. it's been waiting for senate action now. really, it passed the committee back before thanks giving. so it's in the cue, as they say but it hasn't been scheduled. it's something really important because the current law believe it or not hasn't been updated since the great depression, since 1938 so it really is outdated. it's not up to speed with really the current marketplace, the way that we get our food now. it's totally different than it was back in the 1930s. and we've got a lot of people getting sick. host: so how does the food safety bill address those issues and what are the nuts

and bolts? guest: they're fairly similar. the basic change is that the way that the old law works and the law we use today unfortunately is just reactive. it reacts if somebody gets sick or if there's contamination found, which is really not the way that we need to regulate food now. what we really need to do is to make surthe food that gets into the food system, that gets into the supply chain is safe and that's the way the law would work. it would have strong standards so that before it gets into the grocery stores and on to your dinner plat we're sure that we've got safe food, which is fundamentally what we need. host: and how does it exactly work before it gets to the grocery store? guest: there are a couple things necessary. you need to stay on top of how the food is processed. you'll notice on the she will fs food from all over the world. and we only inspect about 1% of the food that comes into the united states from overseas which isn't enough to check. also, the food factories

themselves are only inspected about every ten years. so clearly we've got a serious problem with failure to oversee. and that's not so much the agency's fault. it's really the lack of authority and lack of resources to really do its jobs. the other fundamental problem is believe it or not you hear about recalls all the time. those recalls are not mandated. the food and drug administration bloove it or not doesn't have the authority if they know there's contaminated food to order a recall. they have to ask for a recall, a voluntary recall. so there are fundamental problems with the lack of enforcement authorities for fda to do its job. host: so if it upgrades, does it have the pure man power to make it happen? >> that's going to be a fundamental question. we believe they're grossly understaffed. they don't have the number of staff and inspectors and experts on staff that they need. so the house bill would authorize a fee that would be paid by the food manufacturers,

a small fee, that would help to pay for f.d.a. the senate bill does not include that. but we think through appropriations which is money from congress, or through a fee there needs to be more resources. host: eric olson, our guest to talk about food safety issues. the numbers are on the bottom of your screen. as far as categories of food, what in your mind has to be the closest? is it meat, is it dairy? what's imported? what really has to be looked at first? guest: the whole food system needs to be look add. this legislation really would only upgrade the standards for f.d.a., food and drug administration regulated food,

which is about 80% of the food supply. right now, meat and poultry are separately regulated by the u.s. department of agriculture. so this bill unfortunately doesn't touch that, but that's just because of how the legislative process works. so that 80% includes everything from canned goods, from pretty much everything that you buy in the grocery store except for meat and poultry are going to be regulated by the food and drug administration and helped by this bill. there's certain categories of food that we see that are posing greater risk. but honestly, nobody thought really peanut butter was a big risk until several years ago we started seeing outbreaks. so it's important that we have an across-the-board law that protects bodes the industry and the public. what happens is when we keep having these recalls we repeatedly see millions of dollars being lost by the farmers and by the industry because they get hit even if

they're producing good food consumers stop buying things like pea nuts or whatever, those kinds of products, even if the food that was produced was safe. host: what kind of dollars? guest: just one example is the peanut outbreak, you probably remember from last year when the peanut corporation of america was responsible for this contamination problem, thousands of products were recalled and just a single company, kelllog announced that they had lost around $70 million just from that single recall. so we're talking large dollars. we actually have commissioned a study that found that the total cost per year of food-borne illness are about $150 billion per year to the u.s. economy. so this is a major problem that really needs to be addressed. host: is there a common outbreak that gets investigated time and again? guest: we're seeing just repeated outbreaks with a variety of foods. we're seeing some of the leafy greens, for example, are a

cause of problems lately, a lot of recalls of those. but honestly, it's very difficult to know exactly which foods are most risky because the current system really doesn't allow us to track it very well. so often people get sick and they don't know. they may say they have a stomach flu. you and i have probably had this situation. where you get kind of sick, you don't know what it's from. and very often that's from food-borne illness. host: first call from new york on our republican line. go ahead. caller: good morning. my concern really comes down to government regulation and bureaucracy. it seems like we're spending a lot of money for regulation and not getting very much benefit at all across the board. i'm concerned further regulation is going to cost the taxpayers further and then not

seeing very much benefit at all, whether it's importing plastic with contaminants from china, communist countries, against our ideals, or anything else. i don't see -- i see the taxes going up but where is the benefit? guest: well, i would say that this is an unusual piece of legislation in washington these days where you have very strong support from both democrats and republicans. you have conservative republicans in the senate like sax by chambliss, senator ensly, and many other conservative members of the republican party that are co-sponsors of this bill because it's very carefully balanced, it's very cautious about not overregulating, it's very cautious about not making sure that everything is done in a common sense way. and fundamentally, i don't think anybody including the industry believes that the current situation is, can maintain itself.

that we can't live in the 21st century with a law that's over 70 years old that overagely actually was signed by -- originally signed by president roosevelt over a century ago. so we need to update it and be cautious about making sure it's not overreaching. but the legislation is very careful and cautious about that. it's been negotiated and it's actually in the senate bill and house bill were both supported by the grocery manufacturers association as well as by a coalition that i'm part of called the make-our-food-safe coalition. that will really strongly support moving this forward. it includes a lot of consumer groups, public health and medical groups and others. so there's broad support. it just needs to come to the senate floor.

guest: we believe there clearly is room on the senate floor for this. it would probably only take less than a day for the senate to fully consider this because it's not really controversial. it's not like a lot of other bills you read in the newspaper where there's a bitter partisan divide over it. there's no such thing over here. it got very broad support for it. and the writer is correct that there are a lot of illnesses, centers for disease control and prevention or cdc estimates about 5,000 deaths per year in the u.s. and several hundred,000 people hospitalized every year from food borne illness. so it's a serious problem here in the u.s. the numbers overseas is very hard to compare because the way that the data is collected is different. certainly, our disease burden is major, is significant, and our law is much more outdated than most other industrialized countries.

host: carol on our democrat's line. caller: thank you. good morning. my main concern is not so much the acute food borne illnesses that occur but rather what the government allows to be put in the food to begin with. we have supposedly food dye that is are not harmful, you have drugs that are in just about everything. you have this in food as well as cosmetics. now, the government will say that this is harmless but it is not. this is something that is foreign to the body, this is something that the body has to process, the liver has to -- it overworks the liver, it accumulates in the body. bur you chemical companies are getting rich, you know, and

your food companies, you know, sticking their products and putting these artificial ingredients in our food is damaging, the human dna. it's killing the public slowly. guest: these are the so-called food additives or chemical additives in food. there have been concerns raised by skinets about certain of those additives. it's clear that not all of them are harmful. but certainly of them have raised flags by scientistses that really are somewhat concerned. the pew health group which i'm part of has just launched a new product look at these additives to evaluate what the science is because we think there are concerns about some of them. some of them are probably harmless but some of them may be presenting risks. and it's something we're looking at. again, the current law for those additives really hasn't

been updated in over 50 years. so this is another one where we're not really regulating very well right now and we need to take a hard look at whether the current rules are adequate. host: your group put out an interactive map. what kind of purpose are hoping to get from people who are interested in it? guest: make our food safe.org there is a map that you can look at you're state and see what the burden, what the costs of food-borne illness is in your state. the data was generated by a former f.d.a. economist who evaluated what the costs are on a state bi state basis. the costs are staggering. this is harming the u.s. economy, it's harming people that you have hundreds of thousands of people going into the hospital and being hospitalized just the cost of that are enormous. so what we're hoping is that we

can prevent a lot of those illnesses by updating the law. it really is up to the senate to move that forward and we think it could go through very quickly. host: and it says, according to the research i have here is that a good deal happens in the northwest. is there a reason for that? guest: all 50 states have very -- northeast. a lot of it has to do with the population of course if you've got a large population it costs more so the bigger states have a larger burden as a general matter. and it's also associated with what the health care costs are. some states it's more expensive than the others. host: and as far as cost per case is concerned when you factor in, states such as connecticut are about $1,500 per residents and states like kentucky are about $1,000. guest: and that's of course an average for a specific type of illness. but the fundamental problem is that if you're not preventing those illnesses, you're going to continue having these costs all the time. and it's obviously very bad if

you've got hundreds of thousands of people being hospitalized. but what's really heart breaking are these stories we've actually worked with families who have lost children or have lost members of their family to food borne illness. one that comes to mind is there was a young boy named kyle who lived in idaho who was two years ofplttede he consumed some spinach in a smoothie. his mother made for him. she was very health conscious. he became ill a couple days later. they sent him to the hospital. he was in agony. they had to take a helicopter and transport him to utah to a specialist in the hospital. and, unfortunately, he died. and that's not as unusual as you might think it is. it's a situation where very often the young, very young and the elderly are at greatest risk. but honestly, just about anyone can get sick from food-borne i wills in. and you can't pick up that bag of spinach or the food off the

grocery shelf, be it a peanut product and know. you're not going to wash off your peanut butter sandwich or some of these processed foods and solve the problem. guest: we don't think that's true. we think that you can certainly be producing high quality safe food and transporting that into the marketplace. the problem is that we just have an outdated system. we don't really have the strong watchdog that we need. we don't have the strong laws that the watchdog needs at f.d.a. to make sure that the food that's going into the grocery store is going to be guaranteed to be safe. so -- and, frambingly, most people in the united states are just never going to be the point where they can grow on their apartment building roof or elsewhere all their food. we're sort of in the 21st century. it is great if people can grow

their own food and we're supportive of that and think there are health reasons to have more fruits and vegetables, for example, which is a great thing. but we don't think we're going to be all self-sufficient with gardens in our back yards. host: how are they doing in regulating themselves or overseeing themselves in this process? guest: i think most of the people in the industry are trying to do the best job they can. the problem is it only takes one bad actor, one bad apple, full, to potentially contaminate the entire food chain. so one example is you've got a spice that somebody purchases that comes in from overseas. they'll put that into their food. they may or may not have fully evaluated all the way up the chain. maybe it was produced in china or india and there aren't any real regulations that are adequate for that spice. that can be put into a food and the entire food chain can be

contaminated downstream. so even in an industry is doing its level best you can have contamination problems. and you do have the bad actors, the folks where they are not keeping their factory clean, where they're avoiding and skirting and cutting costs. and in that situation again the peanut situation last year where you had literally thousands of products being recalled. host: what's been the most effective way to monitor this if it does require more regulation? is it added source, added processing? what's the best way to do it and be efficient? guest: you need to be, first, the way that this legislation would work is it would focus on what these points where where the contamination is most likely to occur. so it's not overregulating, it's requiring the companies to take a look at their process and evaluate using f.d.a. guidelines where in that process it's most likely to see contamination. and then, to address that and

monitor it. and obviously you need a cop on the beat. you need f.d.a. to be in the factories checking every once in a while, not every ten years. but you really need to make sure that it's safe from the farm all the way to the fork so that you've not having a contamination problem anywhere on that chain. host: independent line from cape cod. go ahead. caller: good morning. i feel that we're focusing so much on the food safety, which of course is quite necessary, but we appear to be overlooking the containers and the rafltse that they're in. there is a great overuse of plastic -- wraps that they're in. there's a great overuse of plastic. apple juice is in plastic. and try buying cranberry juice

in anything other than plastic. and even lick your now is -- l nch quor is in plastic. and while we may have safe food we're contaminating it with some of these things. and even these flimsy plastic bags for buying produce in a super market, they are very cheap and the first thing i do is get -- i have no other way of conveying what i'm buying such as bagels or things such as that nature, i empty and get rid of those bags because they i think this is -- it's to an extent, contaminating the food. guest: again, you put your finger on something that there are a lot of skinets that are

evaluating whether some of those plastics may leach contaminants into the food supply. there is one chemical, bpa, that is a cause for concern that many experts are saying may have some toxic properties. it's something that we very much as part of this project that i mentioned earlier looking at food adtist, we're looking at not just the chemicals i think tensionly added but also those that can leach from bottles and containers into the food supply. we would like to make sure that the regulatory system addresses that as well. this legislation right now as it's currently drafted is looking mostly at the microbes and the bugs in the food, but we agree that we need to be looking at these chemical adtist either intentionally added or the thing that is can leach into the food from containers. guest: it's a serious issue where we've got a lot of our

food increasingly we're seeing foods that's imported and you can hardly buy -- if you go into your local pizza shop and buy a slice of pizza, that food may have come from all over the world. cheese that is from one country, tomato past that may have come in from south america, spices that came in from china or india. you may have a variety of ingredients that come from all over the world. and we're only inspecting about 1% of the imported food that's coming into the u.s. so of course most of that is going to be safe food, but if we don't have a regulatory system that's policing that, what we saw with mel mine for example, you may remember with pet food contamination and in china there were tens of thousands of children that got extremely sick from mela mine that got into baby formula there. so you need a strong system that is checking, doing testing and detecting contaminants so

that we're not allowing just self-policing to solve this issue. host: madison, wisconsin is next. todd on our democrat's line. caller: good morning. quick question, recently in wisconsin here we had a debate over milk, past rised versus nonpast turized. and as far as my feeling is, is that if the person wants to drink the nonpasture rised milk, that's up to them. i know many years ago i used to go to the family farm and help out and we would drink that milk. took you a little bit to get used to it but certainly didn't get sick. so i'm kind of wondering, if i can get your opinion on the pasturized versus the nonpasturized milk and what is the big deal? i'm thinking that, again, if a person wants to drink the nonpasturized, that's their prerogative. and i have in the past and had not gotten sick. and i'll take your comments off

the air. thank you. guest: thanks for the call. i guess i'm not an expert on past turized versus nonpasturized milk. so my punt on that, but i will say one of the things that we feel important is that science be used to make these decisions and that the companies be held accountable or the producers be he would accountable for the food they're producing. fundamentally this is the approach the bill would take is you want accountability, and if there is a readily available way to avoid contamination, to ensure that that readily available way to avoid it is put in place. host: smun off of twitter. guest: that's a very important question. the way that the current bill, the bill that passed the house, for example, and we don't have a final senate bill yet, there are certain exceptions to the rule. so if you're selling processed

foods, for example, in a farmer's market there would be less restrictive rules that would apply to that. there's been some debate about what to do about this issue in the senate. i think it's been largely resolved. snast tester has raised the issue. so there will probably be certain provisions. and what we need to do is scale the requirements to the size of the producer so you don't have craft being regulated in exactly the same way as somebody that's producing jelly in their kitchen and selling it at a farmer's market. so that's really going to be the approach that f.d.a. has repeatedly said that they're going to use. host: hold on the line. we go next to dorothy from west virginia, republican line. go ahead. caller: good morning. i would like to see the problem of improper butchering of chickens address ds by the food and drug administration. it just seems like every time i

buy chicken legs in the market, they have blood around the bone and i would like to see them slaughter chickens so their blood is drained out is that possible? guest: well, this actually, this legislation addresses only food that the f.d.a. can regulate, which is not meat and poultry which are regulated by the u.s. department of agriculture. unfortunately, the laws that apply to chicken and to other poultry as well as to meat are also outdated but they've been updated more than 70 years ago. that may be something that congress needs to look at in the future is both the safety of that food and how it's produced. host: palm springs, sorry. first up, clover field, tennessee on our independent line. ted, good morning. caller: good morning. this is a great topic, something i am well versed in and i am going to put some facts on you that are

documented. i will submit that we are under attack by our own government. recently, the meeting of code disalmen tear yuss, it is a food value implementation trade organization started by a nazi, convicted nazi by the name of demers, who was of course made the chemicals for hitler, he started this company which our congress made in 2009 as the food implementation for the amount of vitamins that would be in our food. you can only know where that's going. i will also submit that gmo foods which are not labeled here are poisonous. you could put gmo corn next to

regular corn and rats wouldn't eat it. i would submit that asper tain which is a known poison that comes from a made-up bacteria excrement, that's what it is, is -- causes 94 known attacks on the body that the f.d.a. will admit to up to and including death. i will submit that fluoride in our water, which was first used on humans in the nazi concentration camps as they were testing drugs on people, they found that flure ride lowers the iq 20 points immediately. host: with all those submissions, what do you want our guest to tackle? guest: i would submit that all of these things are a concentrated and deliberate

attack on the american people. these things not only shorten our life. because the first time in our history our children now have a lower life expectancy than their parents. host: we'll leave it there. guest: well, there's a lot in there to address. i guess i think that some of what the caller has raised is i don't agree with. i do think that there are certainly some issues with a need to fully disclose what is in our food, what additives have been added, and to make sure that we've got strong regulatory system. i would agree that we really need to strengthen how we're controlling the contaminants in our food supply. but i think i don't agree with everything that he had to say. . .

guest: the caller raises something -- the u.s. department of agriculture regulates meat and poultry. the way that the current law works is that it is up to the u.s. department of agriculture to ensure that that meat is safe and the poultry is sacred the food and drug administration has a separate authority for chemicals added to food. unfortunately, we have another situation where the regulatory system probably is not up to snuff in regulating some of the feed additives. we have a program to look at increasing amounts of antibiotics that are regularly added to speed -- to feed for

animals that are being slaughtered and put into our food system. it appears that may be contributing to the antibiotic resistance for some of the bugs that are getting into humans that is something we need to look at. the longer something sits on the shelf their more -- the more there is a chance for something to get contaminated with bacteria multiplying. that is why it is important to be careful about where you get your food. host: what about something comes from the ground? do you look at what fertilizer is used? guest: only regulates -- this only regulates fresh fruit and vegetables and one thing required would be standards for produce so that you are not using roffman miller before you

harvest food. -- using raw manure. host: to, park, maryland, you are up next. caller:"washington post," page 25, the talk about a chicken dinner. perdu and tysson foods, the rest of the food is contaminated. "the washington post" may 7, 2010, there are 80,010 --

chemicals and the government has i have a book in front of me that says how to prevent and to treat cancer with natural medicine. it is written by a former medical doctors. they have documented 1.2 billion chemicals in american food, water, and everything. every american has 5 pounds of chemical carcinogens. this is not a matter of of food coming from china or italy or wherever or food from afca or wherever. host: i guess he is making the case that it is chemicals. guest: i think the caller is right sprayed chemicals are not well-regulated in the united

states. he is referring to about 80,000 chemicals incomers of which only a few hundred have been fully tested. there is a separate piece of legislation that would start to address chemicals that are added into commerce for consumer products. this legislation is fairly narrowly focused. it tries to get at the poorly regulated system for food safety to address the microbes that are making people sick every year. host: you said the grocery manufacturers passed off on this legislation? what about the manufacturers. guest: there are companies that produce foods.

the people that manufacture most of the stuff you buy and a gross restorer, most of the processed foods, they are now on board. host: is there any chance of working its way before this session ends a few weeks and from now? there is guest: they could -- guest: there is a good chance they can move this forward out of the financial reform bill has passed. there is a window here. it would not take that much time. we think they could do it in less than a day because it is not controversial. host: normal, mich., on our democrats line. caller: an old college buddy of yours says hello. i think the main issue is that people are wasting water.

i came across an article that obama singh's 12 songs and a shower. host: topeka, kan., on a republican line. caller: i am amazed when i have a recall. that means like millions of pounds. it seems to me to be indicative of something, maybe a lack of inspection. can you tell me why that is? guest: the fundamental problem is you have identified it is that we are not controlling safety before it gets into the food chain for the grocery store.

what we need to do is regulate the food as it is produced and make sure that before it goes on to the trucks or onto the trains and before it gets to the grocery store that it has been checked and has been fully control to make sure it is safe. if you look at the fda website and look at the recalls, it is every week we see one. it is a serious problem and we need to go up the chain and make sure the food is safe before it gets to people's grocery stores and onto our dinner plate. host: what is the dollar amount? guest: the senate bill has not been announced yet but the house bill is around $200 million. that is a pretty reasonable price considering the costs are over $150 billion. this really makes a lot of sense to be preventing this contamination by controlling it. this is a classic case of an

ounce of prevention and many pounds of cure. host: can technology play a role? guest: absolutely, technology can play a large role. some food processors can quickly check the food before it goes into the containers to make sure that we are decontaminating the equipment to make sure that we are tracking the food so if there is a problem they can quickly recall it. that has been one of the big issues that when contamination is found or somebody gets sick, in many cases, it has taken months before we can figure out all the foods that have been contaminated by the same factory. host: kansas, go ahead. caller: great topic. i know the department of agriculture regulates and meat. your guest was talking about common-sense legislation.

there was a small remanufacture that wanted to test for mad cow disease for export business and was denied that ability. it would have allowed that a niche business to ensure their meat was saber than what was mass-produced -- was safer than what was mass-produced. what with the cost of industry be to insure that anything we bought in the grocery store could be easily labeled as to what country that originated in? thank you again so much for trying to address this real serious issue that is going on. guest: thank you, caller. your point about country of origin labeling or cool as it is called is something that people are trying to encourage and get

rules that are standardized and would strengthen the requirements for country of origin labeling this as so you know where the food is coming from that you're eating. there are certain requirements now but there are concerns how strong that is. with respect to whether a producer should be able to advertise -- they have tested their food and make sure it does not have a certain contaminant, that is something we are interested in looking at once this basic food safety legislation passes, we will need to work with a meat safety system and what the restrictions are and what the better producers have been looking for. some of them would like to label and take certain steps to show what they are doing and others are not. we think that is worth looking at. you do not want misleading statements to be made. if somebody is doing something and going the extra mile, there are reasons you could all argue

that would be disposable. we are importing a lot of food from canada. we are importing a lot of food from mexico. we get it from all over the world. china is a major producer. it depends on the specific food and time of year. some of our fresh fruits and vegetables, the majority are coming in from overseas or from mexico. host: if the regulation passes and we put this new kind of enforcement into it, how does it impact other countries? guest: we need to have an international system that is up to snuff. the way the legislation would work is that the u.s. would establish its own standard that would apply both to its own producers and to overseas producers. if you are importing food from another country, you would have to certify that that met the

u.s. standard and would be authority through the food and drug administration to go overseas and expect -- and inspect, if necessary, the entire food chain. host: the last call is wallingford, conn. caller: i would like to consider that 99% of the animals eaten by americans are raised under the methods and treatment of factory farming. i am wondering what legislation has taken into consideration in so far as the manner in which the animals are deprived and the ethics behind it and the way in which it has affected the meat brought to our tables. i believe you can make a serious case for not just the pumping up of chickens with salt water but the manner in which these

animals are deprived of entreated and where all of their body systems are screwed up, how this affects the way the meat comes to our tables. i am not just talking about -- i am talking about the uniform manner in which all of these animals are raised date today. i am not talking about the brutality that exists on these farms where you have sadistic stuff from time to time that comes to life but the day to day wait and the manner in which this bears upon the quality of the meat that comes to the table which 99% of the meat is and americans eat a date today. guest: there is a separate piece of legislation out call the preservation of antibiotics for medical treatment act that does address one of the key aspects of the factory farms which is

the antibiotics that are added to animal feed that may be contributing to antibiotic resistance for people and animals. that is a separate law that is probably going to take longer to move through congress. that is something we strongly support. that would help to address some of the problems you are raising. fundamentally right now, we could move the broader food safety legislation that has very broad bipartisan support through the senate within a matter of one week or two. we feel that is an extremely important to move that now. host: if you want to learn more about the health map of airborne illnesses, you can go to the website. you can also check our website, c-span.org. our last topic talks about

comprehensive reform. our next guest wrote an op-ed that it is overrated. we will tell you why in a few minutes. >> date are the towering figures and they are all different. they have their different talents and their different dangers. >> this weekend the trilogy of books on russian leaders, lenin, stalin and leon trotsky. learn about their relationships and their form of developing their own brand of communism. that is sunday night on cspan's "q &a."

>> the cspan congressional directory is a reference guide to every member of the house and senate, the president's cabinet, the supreme court justices and state governors. order it online at c-span.org/ store. cspan is now available in over 100 million homes bringing you washington your way as a public service created by america's cable companies. "washington journal"continues host: you think the comprehensive conform is overrated, what is that? guest: there has been a move to sell the entire categories of problems. there are enormous bills. i criticize this on several levels. one reason is that you have these 2300 bills like financial

regulation. not everyone has read all the pages percent in most of these cases, it is not necessary to solve every problem before you solve any problem. i argue that in some cases, not in all because there are situations like immigration in which you have to solve several problems simultaneously. that is true of health insurance as well. in many cases, it would be better if congress had a piecemeal approach to reform of breaking a problem down into separate problems that can be addressed. host: make the argument that for the average american they like a big approach to a big problem. guest: this is partly because of the misleading information people get. if you go back and look at the history, there were not just big

banks of legislative reform. there have been financial reforms in the 1930's following the greatx$d# depression, thatk an entire decade. the way we think about this as a complete statute all at once, we should think of it as a structure you build brick by brick. host: there is a chart in the newspaper this morning about the financial regulation bill and it shows the time line for the various elements part of it deals with the financial stability and debit interchange. as far as passing a bill, what is the process or the success rate of passing a comprehensive reform bill and seeing all the elements of the bill worked out? guest: the financial reform bill is different because congress is passing the football

to the regulators. in this particular area, congress is delegating authority to come up with the rules to regulators and the future. it is handing them the canvas and paint and telling them to paint the picture. we will approve or disapprove down the road. host: we will talk about comprehensive reform as it applies to the various pieces of initiative here on capitol hill. the numbers are on your screen is there a case for comprehensive reform works? guest: in the case of immigration reform, that was a failure. the basic approach -- host: you mean the one that

president bush tried it? guest: it came close to working but you have to solve problems simultaneously. they pushed it too far. if you are going to tighten security, you have to be specific about the immigrants who are here already. you would have 12 million people trapped within your borders. if it had been limited to an adjustment of status of illegal immigrants and the various security measures, that would have been an example of a comprehensive bill at work. they simply added to many different features to these particular lobbies. the business community is one of hundreds of thousands of new guest workers on top of all these other provisions. organized labor opposed to this. host: did the piecemeal approach works best in recent history? guest: if you look at the

financial reform bill, it would have been better if a particular element of it like the consumer protection bureau had been voted on separately instead of being watered down. that is true of the treatment of derivatives and true of the volcker rule. you probably would have had a stronger role of their had been up and down the boat instead of having this as part of the deal. host: first call is cherry hill, new jersey, on our democrats line. caller: good morning. i hear you guys talking and this gentleman saying it is overrated. i hear all the republicans talking about the financial reform bill and every bill that they are no good.

everything is no good. i have not heard a republican since obama became president say anything is any good. we have these giant banks but they are so much more than banks ruling our country. between the corporations and banks and oil companies and the republicans want nothing. they won no regulation. john behner actually came out and asked to have a moratorium on regulation. i have never heard such a thing. this country needs adult supervision. guest: that is a different subjects. i am not arguing from any particular part of some perspective. -- partisan perspective.

these enormous packages have weakened the reform elements by giving a small amount of senators of veto power3 r. there was the public auction in the health-care bill. they seem to be blocking legislation simply as a political strategy. that is a different issue. host: peoria, ill., our republican line. caller: good morning. can you hear me? host: you are on. caller: outcome freddie mac and fannie mae were not involved in this? they were the reason that the housing market went the way it did guest: reportedly, they will be the next topic of reform in

congress after the election. that shows you the kind of random nature in what is included in actual reform. you could make a case for resolving the status of fannie mae and freddie mac and whether they should be privatized again it is not clear to me that there is a coherent process for what goes into a multi-thousand page comprehensive bills and what is left out a perfect example is an issue that should be dealt with on its own merits. than being a part of some multi-dimensional deal with lots of of the two points in a comprehensive package host: is there a danger in doing this piecemeal of getting bogged down in the individual points in not

getting something done rather than just trying to package it all together? guest: a lot of these comprehensive bills including the health care bill and financial reform had staggered calendars. if you are arguing that all of this had to happen simultaneously, the structure of these bills that staggers implementation is in there. host: our independent line is next. caller: republicans and the corporate news media called bad is good and good his bed. i was listening to npr this morning about not being in afghanistan republicans and corporate media and the people on wall street think that

somehow republicans will sweep the house. what a joke. that is a joke. i called in the other day on npr and they said liberals and democrats would get in. i called the republican line and i got right in. they say republicans will win and democrats would be in trouble. you think democrats are not going to the polls? you think we appreciate every piece of legislation being blocked by republicans? i don't think so. host: san antonio, texas, our republican line. caller: i understand that the health care system -- as an older person i will have to deal

with this new health care system. there are taxes we pay for this benefit and it will month be there for us old folks. guest: i am not terribly concerned about the old folks. they both in this country. middle-aged americans and senior citizens are one of the most powerful forces. if you look at the medical system, the major problem is not medicare as such. it is the growth of health-care costs across the board including hospital rates, pharmaceutical and drugs. we need to address that. one of the problems with comprehensive health care reform is that it does not go to

the root of the problem was this week -- which is this inflation of costs. that makes a mockery of the term comprehensive. that is a major problem threatening the economy. does not lack of coverage. in terms of critical and immediate threats, it does not help costs and all things covered in comprehensive reform accepted that. host: one of the reasons you argue against comprehensive approach is because of leverage as the politicians representing narrow interest spray can you expand on that? guest: if you have multiple bills and flexibility in congress, the republican party has a disciplined response to the majority of legislation. at least there will be a chance of shifting coalitions on different parts of the package.

if it is all one big bundle all tied up together, it will either swing one way or another with swing voters. if you break reform packages up into separate pieces of legislation, it might not be the same swing voters. we are being held hostage by a small number of representatives. host: grosse pointe park, mich., democrats line, go ahead. caller: i have been following this for longer than i would like to admit, the immigration issue, not necessarily reform. if you look at all the major

cable news outlets and television outlets for news, there is one thing everybody seems to be missing and that is before we should consider any comprehensive immigration reform, and we need to consider the economic culture that exists in the immigrant communities. many of these people hold menial jobs like farm laborers. they are sending money back to mexico or south america or central america in huge amounts. they wire transfer out of the money. i am not saying we should tax the wire transfers by could come up with a major banking institution that controls 90% of these wire transfers.

guest: people have addressed the issue of remittances on these wire transfers. it is generally considered to be helpful on the marchers to the development of the countries sending immigrants. no country has ever gone from third world to first world on the basis of donations from other countries. host: as far as the senate is concerned, they talk about how scott brown factored into the voting. guest: that shows you one of the probms. you have senator brown, senator lieberman and they sent -- tend to the centrists.

they have disproportionate power not just on one bill or if you build on every single comprehensive package. their concerns may be legitimate. is likely that a few individuals will have disproportionate power it to approach energy as a single all or nothing package instead of a series of laws passed over a number of years. that is true of emigration. it may be true of subsequent financial legislation. it also includes the fate of a fannie mae and freddie mac. host: abilene, texas, on our independent line. you are on. caller: hi. i am a first-time caller.

i am inquiring about the premium mortgage insurance. host: you are listening to feedback. mikki question or comment, please. caller: this would apply to fha loans about 10 years ago host: there may be some interference on the line. let's go on to rockville, maryland, on our democrats line. caller: in order for someone to get reelected regardless of whatever party, they have to have accomplished in getting things past or blocking things from being passed. in the partisan environment we have, don't you need comprehensive things to get something passed? if it is just piece mill and things are salt and you do not have something substantial to show to your constituents, how

do you expect to get their endorsement for the next election cycle? guest: that is an excellent question. presidents have more pressure, in particular members of congress and the senate. the only one of many members of the team voting on this. as long as you argue that you voted in a particular position where you are in agreement with your constituents. one point that has not come up yet is the fact that the parties have become much more disciplined in the last decade or so than they were. we have always had nominally a two-party system but in practice it was a four party system. you can combine southern conservatives and ignore the progressives on labor. republicans used to combine an

international, pro-wall street approach with western, a more populist isolationist principles. you see this in these campaigns by conservatives to purge moderate republicans. i think that is a problem. if you have more cross-p partisan cooperation, when legislation is passed, democrats and republicans and other groups of democrats and republicans would favor it.

it would break up some of the stalemate. host: he is a policy director. warwick, rhode island, on our independent line. caller: good morning. i would like to address the immigration issue. i would love to see you invite dr. george borhas. he has proven that we do not have a worker or shortage of any kind. we do not pay attention to the mass of homelessness problem in our country. the first call you have from michigan where he talked about the corporate media, i used to be a democrat. i am an independent. i will never vote democrat again.

they are the ones covering for everything that goes on now. it is not the republican party better putting the american worker up on the auction block, our infrastructure, destroying our economy. caller: comprehensive reform is overrated, i agree. i want to turn the debate to a different issue. people are unable to connect the dots with all the gridlock in washington and the democrats losing seats in the house that will get worse. there's a possibility that people are scared about jobs and immigration. in 2012, we will get a demagogue elected and we could have some kind of right-wing dictatorship in this country. i will take my hat off the air. guest: i think there will be a

possibility that you will have demagogues' as politicians. that is continuing to grow. it looks as if the two parties are locked in this and nothing can be done. there are some outside the system to run against the system. i think our system is sufficiently resilience to dictatorship. i would not be surprised if we have a weak economy for a number of years and there is no perceptible improvement as a result of congressional legislation and presidential leadership. you will see figures who are anti-system politicians like ross perot or huey long in the 1930's. i think you'll see more of that in the next few years. host: you say there is a tendency to define every issue with a blanket solution. guest: that the assumption of all of us here in washington

there are some problems you simply have to live with. you just have to treat them. there is no cure for it. host: such as? guest: there is an irreducible amount of poverty. there are cases of multi- generation policy. we need to do everything we can to help individuals out, but there will always be a percentage of poor people that will have to be taken care of. there is a minimum amount of corruption that will take place in politics. we should try to reduce it by passing campaign reform but human nature is what it is. the purpose of law and policy is not necessarily to solve problems once and for all. in some cases where it is a condition you live with, you make it more bearable. you reduce the severity of the.

there is a trade-off. there's a certain amount of failure and distress. host: houston, texas, on our independent line. caller: why is it that the doctors are not going to accept medicare payments but what -- but yet when you are in a group insurance like aetna, they pay $2,000 and it was accepted? i don't understand what the differences between a private insurer plane -- paying a reduced rate and medicare or medicaid paying a reduced rate. what is the difference? guest: that is a good question and you will have to ask a medical expert. many people do not realize that about half of the medical costs

in this country are covered by the government. the other half is private it is purchased by plans that negotiate with providers. we actually don't have a free market in terms of medical care. we have two kinds of entities, the government on one hand and these employer-based group plans negotiating to set prices with doctors and hospitals and drug companies. that is why many people you need to have some sort of system like an all-payer negotiation where the same prices are paid whether it is for a doctor who takes medicare patients or a doctor who takes patience from a private group health plan. the worst-case scenario, you could be an individual and you

do not have the bargaining power that the federal government has. host: if emigration comes up in a comprehensive form, how does it differ from the last approach? is it a better approach this time around as far as the administration is concerned? guest: senator charles schumer has been the point man on this. form it might take. i think it is repeating exactly the same mistakes last time. you have the security less time which conservatives insist on and you have the passage to citizenship which liberals insist on person. you also have the guest worker status which is an indentured servitude. all americans need to be part of

any immigration bill. some employers and industries like agriculture are saying that they cannot be expected as american businesses to hire americans or legal immigrants and paid and decent wages and let them quit their jobs. we need the growers to demand a labor force that does not have the rights but american workers have. when these illegal immigrants quit their jobs, they must go back to their country of origin. i was disturbed to see this included in senator shimmer possible bill% -- senator charles schumer's bill. we need more unskilled labor.

if we really did, let them be illegal immigrants with green cards. if the administration and congress to abide to this dead comprehensive immigration bill including this terrible guest worker position, it will probably suffer the same fate that comprehensive immigration reform did in 2007. host: silver spring, maryland, on a republican line. caller: we have seen several comprehensive reform packages but no budget passed. it seems like there is a lot of implementation and it seems like it is a better bet than promises.

i heard on another radio show that there is a 5% tax increase starting january 1 for all taxpayers. do you know anything about that? guest: i am not aware of that. host: reno, nev., good morning. caller: i want to make one comment before you start talking about immigration reform. native americans and mexicans were here way before the white man came across and conquered this country. before you talk about immigration, we are the illegal ones here. you guys are so full of yourselves. guest: i think you have to include the black man and asians, as well.

we have 310 million americans. from over low -- from all over the world. the challenges the injustices done against american indians and african-americans. the challenge of the 21st century iss to cover all of thee different backgrounds prin. host: will the committee's meeting on this make it more palatable challenge? guest: they are public servants. it will be much more beneficial to the public because you will not have these last-minute deals being done and announced in the press a few days later. during the health care bill, at the last minute, the idea of reducing the age of medicare it eligibility to age 50 was

bloated. senator lieberman rejected the idea so it was rejected. that is no way to run a railroad. these are profoundly important decisions that affect the fate of everyone in this country. it should not be done hastily at the last minute on the fly. if that means taking more time and doing it more cautiously and prudently, these problems will not go away. we have time to solve them. host: statesboro, ga., on our democrats line. caller: the illegal aliens, as they are called, the people here because they need work and they are desperat = feed their families, they need to go after the people that hire them. don't go after the poor people the poor people are always the ones that suffer. if you brought up fannie mae and freddie mac -- i am sick of the

republicans demonizing them. alan greenspan in a congressional hearing said they had very little to do with this financial downfall. they had some but they were not the main cause pri. people forget george bush's home ownership society. he relaxed the standards for people buying homes. please quit blaming fannie mae and freddie mac who tried to help poor people get homes. guest: is true that many of the subprime mortgages were issued by groups like countrywide and other mortgage lenders and backed by fannie mae and freddie mac. the other point the industry made is that we have the three government-sponsored enterprises. there is any may and freddie mac and there are also the

federal home loan banks which had a major role in providing mortgages for working americans. they have not been engaged in scandal. the reason is that fannie mae was privatized in the late 1960's. freddie mac was created. the federal home loan banks are a nonprofit government corporation and have been this entire time. many analysts believe that by turning fannie mae into a publicly traded corporation -- you have all the incentives of a for-profit company which would help up the stock options. at the same time, you had the implicit government guarantees. this was just asking for trouble.

my advice for fannie mae and freddie mac is to merge them. there is no reason to have two. merge them into a single entity and reduce them to the status of non-profit corporations. from the 1930's through the 1960's, fannie mae played a major role in helping ordinary people get mortgages. it was free from the kind of scandals week seek after it became a for-profit organization. host: reseda, calif., a republican line. caller: i read your article on the neo conservatives taking over washington. this all boils down to -- this comes down to where our money is going to appeared we can of the fault -- afford all these services because the neo-cons to

go for washington. neoconservatism is totally a jewish movement because the adl, apac controller congress and president that we are spending billions of dollars dying for wars in the middle east because of israel which apac has pushed us into. they are now trying to get us into a war with iran. -we afford to take care of the poor? host: comprehensive reform is our topic. caller: that is it because that has to do where our money is going. we can't afford to take care of our own people. guest: i disagree with the promise the new conservatism is a jewish movement. is a philosophical answer to cold war liberalism. when it comes to money, the fact

that the united states is not broken and will not go broke -- what has happened as a result of the bush tax cuts is that we have a great gap between our spending and investments. that gives us a choice. we can radically cut back on spending which will affect lower class people or become raise revenues. if you look at the polls, when asked if you should cut social security benefits or raise taxes, most americans want to raise taxes on the bridge. -- on the rich. this is presented in a misleading way. it says that we have no choice except to cousin -- cut entitlements which are crucial. another choice is raising taxes. nobody likes to but i for one

think it would be counterproductive to raise income-tax is too much. the new america foundation has suggested a national consumption tax. that would tax most the necessities so it would be a federal tax. there are also some ideas around and we need to shift the conversation away from cutting middle-class taxes and toward raising revenues that does not fault chiefly on the poor and working americans but also does not impair economic growth host: there is a story this morning that the former federal reserve chairman alan greenspan says that the tax cuts -- the bush tax cuts should expire. guest: that has some credibility because he was a champion of the bush tax cuts. heat was so worried that we would have perpetual surpluses

that he felt that would be bad for the economy and he wanted to completely pay down the debt. he did does not realize at the time that the revenues pouring in during the clinton years came in from a bubble and not a sustainable economy. he wants to repair and now and say that we should repeal the tax cuts. i would tend to agree with that. host: philadelphia, pa., on our democrats line. caller: good morning. all these people are calling saying that the democrats. that is a lot. they were never democrats. they were republicans. you guys don't want anything to improve.

you want things to slide down so you can win an election in november. you want to keep the taxes for the rich and not pay on employment. you want to favre bp and the oil companies and walk all over me? you want to divide us further. we will vote in november. i don't want republicans to get so happy because of the poll numbers. i never believe the polls. that is mainstream media, corporate media. guest: i think that is addressed to republicans, not me. host: grand haven, mich., on our independent line, go ahead. caller: i have a few things to say. i will make it real quick. the woman that called about made of americans -- if you ever have a chance to go out west and see

what the navajo nation and what the united states gave to the navajo nation, you would be appalled. it is nothing but dust and rocks. as far as immigration -- my parents came from europe in 1952. they came here illegally. my brother was born in england. my sister and i were born in the united states. they did it legally. get rid of the illegal emigrants. get rid of everybody that is not here legally. thank you. guest: your callers are interested in the immigration question. i think there is a lot of pressure to do something about it. it is resisted by congress because of how they voted last time. i would suggest that the best way to approach it in order to avert another catastrophic

failure would be to find what elements of immigration reform can be done. you could reduce the backlog of legal immigrants. how can you grant amnesty to people who have violated the law? people have been waiting for years to become citizens. it was suggested that you reduce the naturalization. from five years down to two years. that way you can process the people standing in line and create more wealth. if you want amnesty, you want a one time amnesty. there is simply no political will in this country to round up and arrest and prosecute local people. you do