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tv   American Perspectives  CSPAN  November 13, 2010 11:00pm-2:00am EST

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they also want to thank all of you for coming. as craig said, normally they give this world races and i used to seem some people interested in governors races. when i want and i assumed i was in the wrong room and almost rned around while checkout. it's great to se so many people here because it's just sad, the governors races that have already taken place are going to be the most significant in our political landscape for the next decades comes to talking about what they mean is very important and very useful. and also, i want to say to josh's point, to committees have a long history of mutual respect and sincere. and i do respect a great deal of work the rga did over the past cycle. at a phenomenal cycle and you saw the statistics come the money they raised. fill himself ran probably the best campaign of the two years. so really it is an honor to have both of them. they'll talk about the question at hand.
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the question just asked as i was satisfied with that gain on the republican side of five governorships. the answer to that is yes. we've spent much of this year bracing for much greater republican views. opponents predicted we were going to get annihilated. people were saying that his eight, nine, 10. there was one statistic that within my head every single night went to sleep, which was that according to the university of minnesota, smart politics bob almond democrats were poised than at any point in 90 years. site by then i had at that, going to spend this? [laughter] maybe i can tell people we had a record-breaking year at dga. fortunately -- [laughter] fortunately, we did not have that outcome. i think phil will admit this point, has said publicly they were eecting it to be in the
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30's when all was said and done. we kept them 25. the reason that's a victory for us is we enter the worst political environment since 1994. we were up to spend, outmanned, outgunned by the two to five -- 2.5 to one ratio by the rj -- rga. historical average was 5.5 governorships. the fact this environment we were so that we could keep them to honor historic average, i think is a victory for us. and so, we ended up feeling very good about the fact that we're still in the 20th. but in the twties i mean 20. [laughter] it sounds better if you say in twenties. and you know, we were able to flip side states from republican leadership to democratic leadership. the reason i think that is significant is the only place in the country were democrats made significant inroads in changing
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seas from republican to democrat on the state level and will probably get into whether that's true. but being able to flip side states the republican leadership to democratic leadership in this climate not only as a victory in itself, that says something that i think is still a lecture at worth it to democratic electorate. it is looking for commonsense leadership and still wants change and right now when i said the last election as things in a different government. before the election you talked about the big four states, california, new york, texas. all four of them. how disappointed, excited? >> everyone knows that as vermont and hawaii go -- [inaudible] [laughter] no, we clearly wanted to win florida. we've spent $6 million in
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florida. does a very, very important race to us. we came within 50,000 votes. think we didverything we could peer the climate and environment just wasn't right then. that one was less of a surprise because ted stroup had been chilling in the polls for the entire year. he did come up strong at the end, but wasn't enough to win. so obviously i'm disappointed in both of those, but those losses would've made it a whole lot worse had we not then better in new england states are not putting out one important states like minnesota and oregon and of course california as well. thought to ask another corollary to that question. ok in all the exit polls, all the surveys before the election. i mean, this is looking like a republican white house. he got every key demographic, republicans for the first time, women in the exit polls, white voters like 20, 25 points. this is one of the most lopsided
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elections in quite some time. the fact that you didn't quite win some of the big states, cafornia, the 30 seats -- haley barbour st 30 seats. wathat disappointing or we are expecting some of the candidates not been strong and get that historic number? >> before i avoid answering your question, let me thank the folks at dutko. so many of you been so helpful to us over many, many years, especially the western virginia and the cycle, so appreciate you having us. nathan, congratulations on completing your cycle as executive director. i can tell those of you to watch that stuff in d.c. beating the same committee is tremendously difficult challenging thing to do. it just doesn't happen these
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days and you conduct yourself if i had a great professionalism for actually five and a half years. we look forward to many good things to come. i couldn't be more excited with the results of the election. i mean, we set out at rga really to have an impact on the key presidential battleground states. going into the election, we held two of 10 key battleground states, walking out was that nine of 10. we invested over $50 million in those races. we were able to raise over 100 million -- than of $100 million this year as nathan mentioned. so i think the story for us is really looking at those presidential battleground state, looking particularly at the midwest, you know, you look at wisconsin, michigan, ohio,
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pennsylvania. you know, these are states that world democratic-controlled states, democratic governors with key presidential battleground states in 2012. and you know, they'll now have republican governors since many good candidates. we talk about some of our governor? , folks like scott walker, rick snyder and tom corbett. i think we've got some really exciting people, john k-6 who has got more energy than my 4-year-old niece. it's a lot of fun to watch, jo, go to work. so look, i think getting the neck in a five, sometimes we'll give it a six because of florida, nathan. and 29 is great. and i think we need to take a step back. this was a truly historic electi cycle. and even what degree i think
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that governors races really to drive a lot of what happens down ticket. and the fact we were able to deploy $100 million for students taking spend $14 million for example in new england i think helped her candidates throughout down ticket. and weicked up by the levites of 13 right now stands at 13 congressional seats in new england. we made gains on the congressional side and picked up almost 20 seats in the midwest. so you know, we suffered rue himelfarb 610 to eight and i had to sit on the postelection and they work fine. you look at it and you know for a lot of times the national pundits are saying the republican pares is now a regional party. you know, the south and the midwes well, i think democrats really have that problem now. but got some bastions of support on the coast and in new england, but they've got a real problem
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in the midwest and we made gains in places that i think that they just weren't expecting. craig had metioned something that's critically important, which is state legislative races in the state houses. there were 19 state houses that slipped from democrat to republican. nineteen. talk about an impact on the districting. in 680 seats that went, state legislative seats to at least a minimum of 680 that republicans gained across the country. i think that's going to have a lasting impact over the next decade. so you know, look, we're very pleased with where we are. i can remember growing up playing hockey new england that we werlosing the other team scoreboard. and you know, that's 29 races is something that we're very pleased with and particularly where they are think is going to
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have a huge impact on redistricting and also 202 in the presidential cycle. >> i want to talk about some of the names o some of the people that were elected governorships, that the concept that pass for the presidency, the current president excluded, but most of them come from governorships and we're already seeing it in new jersey chris christie being mentioned and touted as a possible 2012 competitor in 2016. but you're going to be seeing a lot of these first-time governors being mentioned as national contenders for the presidential in 2012 and beyond. i want to go to botnathan and phil. who are the risingtars in this freshman class of governors? >> the rising stars would have to be some fresh faces, jerry brown -- [laughter] neil abercrombie -- [laughter] i would say i think that john
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hickenlooper from colorado will be a star right off the bat. he is a really interesting person. he breaks the political mold. he's socially liberal, fiscally conservative for most of america is quite frankly. he want any part of the country that democrats have not traditionally done well in. in the last decade from really started to taper off. and most importantly, he's an interesting and fun person to be around. he's real. like so many governors, he's a real person and it's got interestingideas. what is funny about him is that he ran a ad that showed him on a horse. and it was kind of a py ad saying if you run for governor of colorado, all your consultants tell you that you have to be right in a horse. and he's the mayor of denver. he's not a cowboy.
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funny thing about yet is the total six months ago, you know, i'm thinking about this at. and it's me in a horse. and you know, he basically drawn up the whole thing himself. but that's the kind of guy h is. he's very creativ [inaudible] >> that's a retake of the one he did in my own race. the shower ad is excellent for those of you who haven't seen it. but i would say -- [inaudible] >> that may have been one of the most memorable ads, john hickenlooper, n exactly the most charismatic candidate, but these into that and he puts on his hidden jumps jumps in the shower. >> was at a pivotaloint of getting his identity out there? >> yeah, it was. the key point is he was fully clothed. >> alice's first ad in this race. and you know, i think it was an
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important ad because it wasn't negative. it was funny i don't want to do a negative vibe vibe. i want a positive campaign. he identified himself as somewhat optimistic. i think about how bad voters still respond better to optimism. not the campaign tactic, negative works. but if you can find a way to have an optimistic message, voters will respond to a better and that's w i think hickenlooper was able to set himself apt soberly on this race. i would say dan lloyd, connecticut will be a rising star. and of course andrew cuomo, everyone knows who he is. he's got a great resume. i can't speak to this, but doherty has been taken on some gger roles. i agree with your premise but on both sides th will be about his leadership coming out of this. i want tquickly follow up on colorado because of such a key battleground state.
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immigration is a major issue that democrats were very successful in many cases i think. how do you look at that as kind of a bulwark for democrats starting in 2012. >> yeah, that's very, very competitive territory. no party has ownership of that part of the country. we've proven we can win there. we still have the governor in montana. we do have a governor of colorado. we had a governor in new mexico and arizon in recent years. we can win in that part of the country. it obviously takes a certa brand of democratic leadership that i think stil exists in person or party, but yeah, that's an important part of the country. i think president obama can win that i 2012. and i think having people like john hickenlooper, brian schweitzer will make that happen. >> great question and i could probably talk and answer the
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question. we have so many new governors first of all. governor donnell was talking this week. he said not one of the senior governors, which is kind of crazy to think about. this was really an histric election for the rga. when you look at the fact we elect the first woman hispanic governor of state and usanna martinez, india american woman and mickey hayley, for women governors, hispanic and brains sandoval in a key state like nevada, really important election for us, for our party going forward well into the future. i think we're going to have a lot of emerging stars. i look at ur current cop of folks that haven't been inaugurated yet and eight think obviously about governor barbour as someone who is a possible
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candidate for president in 2012. he's been not only an exceptional governor and the state of mississippi, but he's got a great strategic mind and i think you'd be obviously a powerful force in any republican nomination for president. you know, you got folks like governor general who has done an incredible job, especially in the wake of the cold spell, oil spill in the louisiana. he's got folks like chris christie and bob donnell who have had just incredibly good first years, yu know, balancing budgets by cutting spending, not raising taxes. chris christie has taken on the ions and is really turn this state around a new jersey. so i think we've got a lot of potential candidates. i think most of the candidates for 12 already out there. you got governor fulani, governor barbour wang, former
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vernor romney runni. but i think you're going to have a number of potential vice presidential that will be interesting on our side. you're going to look at a susanna martinez or a brains sandoval because they're both from swing states. they both have great stories to tell and i thin the list is long. i mean, we could probably go on and on, but it great. i think the other thing that's interesting is for rga at least, this incoming group of governors is pretty tight knit. they talk to one another a lot. so you're going to see a high degree, i think, of policy cross-pollination. and i'll governors across the country are doing with the same set of issues right now, which is how do you balance budgets and a terrible economy? and you know, they're looking at folks like jindall and barbour
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and mcdonnell and fulani who ha done these things over the years. and also i should mention rick perry who by the way we were doing the back of the envelope sort of assessment of governor perry. he said $285 million in negative advertising spent against him over the course of his career. 285 billion was in incredible amount. the state tat dga thought they had a shot at and invested some money in. >> had i known that 285 number, would probably would have not -- [laughter] >> you know, governor. it's been an incredible leader in taxes and somebody who's going to be very prominent i think on the national scene as well going forward. >> phil, i'm struck tha you mentioned a lot of these up and comers in the gubernatorial class, but surely talking -- i remember governor's class where we were already about potential candidates on a presidential
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ticket. you really think after being in office for two, three years they could be seriously considered? >> you? >> you look at chris christie and what he's accomplished. look at his national profile. look at some of the things mcdonnell has been able to do. it's have to be in for a year, but i do think that our current crop of presidential candidates are probably -- i think they're all white males. correct me if i'm wrong. i think we're going to be looking for some diversity on the ticket. and i think we've got that and our current crop of governor select. >> do you believe chris christie? >> yeah, i take governor christie's word that i don't think he's going to run. 2016 is another story. >> i was going to say, i think that it's very possible all the candidates he mentions will be possible 2012 candidates were maybe 2016, but sometime in the
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near future. and the reason i think it is something about makes a governor so compelling, but compelling in this environment. our trust -- are used to users of powerpoint d we talked about how bad the problems are right now and then how will public trust in government is. and that creates a real problem, particularly for folks in d.c. you have to think about washington d.c. because our problems are increasing, but her faith in governmt to fix them is decreasing. but think what that is created as the faith in government is probably at an all-time low. that's why i think we're getting so many people identified independents, not democrats or republicans. democrats are slightly different breed in the sense they are closer to people, most importantly outside of shington d.c. they think for a lot of people, type of leadership we've seen is more like what you want to get the federal level to the leadership in congress. you know, while many times you
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think two years as a governor is not enough experience, i guess it doesn't surprise me so many names to be considered just a big governors to have so much more of what is compelling to people right now. >> i mean, you have a lot of governors coming in, a lot of the governors you mention. it's such a budgetary environment and it's not going to be you cannot benefit from spending a lot of money. a lot of cuts will have to be made. to think they can survive politically? ed rendell, one of the most popular governors two yes ago when he leaves office with approval ratings in the 30's, low 40's. do you think you can survive the subprime? >> absolutely. and i think they c thrive. and i point again to both make donnell, christie, jindall, barbour, governors would've ne it to make deep cuts. you know, one of the things that was certainly the wind was at her back. you know, if you look at some of the issue matrix for the selection, two thirds of the likely voters going into election day, jobs and the
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economy as the number one issue and spending as the number two issue. and we have, you now, democrats in ongress and the president to thank for that, but that was the same issue environment we face it in virginia last year in september and october. bumbling governor's race, but experience in virginia, with the most single out on education and the entire election cycle, which if you had told me that in the governorrace i would've said you're drinking too much that day. but you know, the issue was certainly in our favor and voters generically trust the republics on the economy and on spending. if you look at those governors that have made hard decisions balance budgets by cutting spending, not raising taxes, even, you know, looking at education and health care in areas that traditionally, you know, voters don't like to see us cut, those governors have a lot of support.
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donald cut $4.2 billion in his first year. he is a $400 million surplus in virginia and he's got a 60% job approval rating. chris christie, same thing. and now, and even worse environment. so i hope and pray and encourage all of our candidates or governor select to really look at what some of these other governors have done and make those cuts make them now and hopefully the economy will come around in the next couple of years and mobile to reinvest some key priorities. >> i want to get to audience questions and a little bit, but first i want to do a lightning round of questioning. what were the biggest surprise is? every election you've got some shockers. i was certainly surprised by so of the governors race outcomes. nathan, what was the biggest surprise for you on election night? >> biggest surprise for me probably was illinois.
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>> you told me he thought it was almost over a few months before. >> yeah, that was between you and me. [laughter] he was trailing for most of the selection, you know. and you know several points behind grady. in fact, julius was out pulling him. and to close that cat back i was just amazing and a real testament to him. we did have one person on our staff who insisted for months that he was going to go this race. he told me were by and large democrats who had made up their minds yet and they would eventually come home for pat quinn and he was right. and as just enough margin. >> is very larger lesson that phil brady ran back very tspoken conservative candidate in illinois in the key to winning a lot of elections is
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the suburbs. there are lots of these other states in the future and if their campaign strategy that quinn uses? >> well, yeah. i think with that ratio is that there still is when we have a greater tolerance for mainstream there still a breaking point, particularly in states that have been history of electing moderates. in illinois you have a history of electing moderates from the northern part of the state. phil brady is not one of those. i think it shows even though it are greater tolerance for kansas we still have breaking point. >> do you think illinois was an unpleasant surprise. i think i would agree with nathan that we thought we had a really good shot coming down the stretch the last couple of weeks they are. that's a state where the partnership you see in a lot of cases between the dga and the unions really pay off, whereas we literally had been some reports had 4000 paid workers on the ground in cook county
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leading up to election day. in cook county i tnk the turnout was higher in cook county over the senate race. and really i think at the end of the day, that was the story but there is a better turnout observation based on union support. i think the other surprise that was a pleasant prize for me personally was one of the states that i was dealing with everyday was florida. we came through just a bruising nomination contest, where we had over $70 million spent, you know, 95% which is a negative advertisements. and you know, as our nominee, rick scott had a negative image going into the general election until late primary -- and you know, he was upside down. and you know, we sort of thought alex sink had the makings to be a good candidate.
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didn't turn out that way. i think the skype team ran one of the best campaigns i saw in the untry and what is obviously a critically important state. the rga has spent over $98 billion in florida and i know dga ws heavily involved. so 50,000 votes will take it. it was, you kow, incredibly important to win florida. >> erged in florida, rick scott tens of billions of dollars of his own fortune in california. make would've been spent 120, 130 -- the same amount of her own money and lost by eight, nine points. it wasn't even close. do you want self-funded candidates or could that deeply backfire? >> i think it doesn't easily backfire, but it can backfire. if i remake wi men, men, this is on hindsight. there are smarter than people come by think in hindsight she should've taken a break. she should've let the election
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cool off of it. after she wonthe primary emotion eyebright backup on tv the next day. and so, she had nominated the areas for six months and i think she became her own worst enemy beuse few of us are tired and they built in this narrative she was trying to buy the election rather than earn it. so i think in that case the smarter thing would be to have her beat the budget, take the summer off and let people pull down and started again on labor dawith the new brown was going to win. >> brown was somewhat conventional in many ways. the book, i think california is an example. at t stay where we ran a number of these races where we had income that democratic governors who ere retiring. doyle is a good example, who are in the 30's were the 40's and b approval rating. you know, rendell in pennsylvania. in this case, you know, we at schwarzenegger who i think his job approval rating was literally in the high teens, low twenties. canosa testing. i think the democrats in brown's campaign did a good job linkg.
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there was one ad for they had the same thing. they did a good job sort of linking to schwarzenegger and that was the killer. i also think, you know, the hoekeeper issue, kind of when it came up sort of park to celebrate the middle of the last 60 days of the election. certainly did not help. and we paid the price with the hispanics. i think the overall exit polling showed that we got i think it was 13, 14% hispanics. >> all right. well i wanted to open up the questioning to the audience as i know you all probably have a lot of questions that nathan and so would love to answer. so raise your hand or that they know who wants to ask a question. >> two questions. [inaudible]
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does having jerry brown and not having the prblems or having the problems california is going to have to face, is that a good thing or a bad and for both of you? >> return of the disco era if you will. >> i'm originally from ohio. could you talk more about the downstate because there was a total flip up by think republicans on all of the state races except senator brown in both houses. thank you. >> i think california for all of us in this room, for everybody across the country is a little scary to think about the problems that state is facing from a physical standpoint. i mean, at some point in the next couple years, they are going to be, you know, asking the feds for signifant amount of money and questions whether or not we do it. and i think jerry brown's has
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got a huge, huge challenge on his hands. the people of california have sort of decided we're not going to win races in states where people want higher taxes and, you know, they sort of decided that's what they want. d so, i'm concerned, you know, as a citizen, you know, looking at the economy and the way things are going. look at all the unfunded liabilies in the state of california has. i'm just not sure, you know, how jerry brown's and that legislure is going to dig their way out of the hole. as far as ohio goes, i mean, that was obviously a huge success story for us. we invested heavily in that race, heavily and early. you know, one of the lessons from ohio inmate and i'd be interested to hear what you think about this, literally the last couple weeks, the lessons of that campaign. normally have to deliver 1000
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gross rating points to deliver a single message. in a state like ohio it's literally probably 2500 or 3000 statewide because there was so much going on on tv. all the outside groups come in and so it's obviously a national election. we saw that any member states of states across the country. to the early money there mattered. we invested heavily at rga and early voting, and the infrastructure and state party and somef our key states and ohio. that definitely pay dividends down ticket and across the board. and i think that's obviously a key state in 2012 and we're really excited to have john k. fick, you know, who is going to be a great governor, but also somebody who is not going to shy away from building the party infrastructure. i think that's going to be really helpful to her nominee in 2012. >> can anyone hang on for more than one term? >> i think so.
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i think the story of california is also being told in most other states, probably to a greater deer in california. the fact is most states have to drastically cut their budgets because 49 states have a balanced budget requirement. if you look at the spending fiscal year 2011, overall state spending is 7% less than two dozen eight, which is lester before the recession. all state governments are cutting spending. california has additional problems because there's so hamstrung hamstrung by the referendum requirement. but look, i will quote our chair, governor jack markel of delaware who left in 2008. in a time like this, why do you want to be governor? his response is that the timely is what you need, more than ever, good people to be governor. if you believe in your candidates, which i do, this is the time that you want them in office. it's a whole lot easier quite frankly eight years ago because you have to say yes to
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everybody. it was easy to be popular but a political capital. times like this on the right deficits knife to cut budgets and go back in july caddick and, it's a lot harder to be popular. now is when you need real leaders. if you believe in your candidates, this is when you want them there. the final thing i would say phil is right. one of the things they learned is that relatively speaking you can make a bigger impact earlier out a new kid before because i don't understand, there's some there's some 520 specimens that spent their entire budget the last week of the elections commotions of waste of money. at that point in time, one can be a competing with airtime, everyone of the universe. and to come if voters elect me and all of you, you're not listening to political ads. u're turning theoff. i think the smart thing to do, which i think both dj and rj did effectivelwith start earlier because you get an earlier when people are paying a little more tention.
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>> question. >> yeah. >> make sure you get some exercise this morning. >> question for both of yo. politics in the united states, particularly looking at geography, the southern region, the south of the democrats. sically got wiped out on lection night. democrat operative, republican operative, how do you see that? i've seen enough of this too now i remember when i talked about the republican a lot for president, but there's always resurgence. there's always a way to come back. the kind of looking down the road, you know, how do you deal with that in the coming years? >> well, let me say this. i don't think it's quite as bad as it might look. in the way of elections, you will think it's plus five around the country. so you're already down a couple points.
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you're not going to win that we fear. so it's very tough to win in the south to share. that doesn't mean in a different year we can win. we already for the country and the way the election on top of that is very tough. consider however alex sink came in with 50,000 votes of winning the largest state in the south. another surprise e didn't mention is jeanne shaheen came very close. roy barnes didn't come quite as close as i thought he would, but held his own and important state. so we did run three copetitive races in the south, but in this way of elections where this is the hear from republicans not only have to log down, but they need to in the purple states, too. the purple states have a 50/50 state. this is when you're the party benefiting us to witness with elections. we feel alright we can hold onto some of those purple states and again as we talked before, all of them to some modest gains. i think it was probably too much
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to ask. i think were going to start making inroads and was traditionally difficult territory. >> states like georgia and texas, you know, these are competitive states. i mean, we think about them now. they're southern state, republican states. texas is going to be a minority, maturity state within the next few years. and no, i think that's probably one of the reasons why dga took a serious look in the battle of texas. georgia is a competitive state. and likely would be in good campaigns and have good candidates. but you can't take a think the same thing on both sides. we came within, heck, if you look at new england, you know, you are chewing connecticut and new hampshire and vermont with the three states who came within 20, 30,000 votes of winning all three of the states. so to me the story is more about kindness, you know, what our suburban annex urban voters
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across the country? how they act in? what are they responding to? and how are you communicating their? i think that is really a critical, you know, swing area. when i woke up everyone in my usher in virginia thinking about how do in prince william and loudoun county and fairfax county? had you in you win those areas? what issues do you communicate on quite exciting for both parties, you know, we have to caution against thinking yeah, we've got x, y or z in the bag because we have seen things change rapidly. >> any other questions from the audience? >> given the swing towards the republican side, not just in the gubernatorial races, can you speculate about what you think the implications might be for health care, both national policy and actual execution on the ground in the states?
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>> and were very republican republican governor strike to put sand in the levers of the health carlaw. it's going to be goo at what are the implications? the >> yeah, i don't think so. i think would be more interesting to see what happens in congress now that they've taken over the house. i don't think there's gointo be any germanic changes in large part because i think as time goes on, particularly to the benefits of health care become relays, people will come not more accustomed, but re appreciative of what it is the democrats passed. >> how long does it take for the benefits to become realized? >> you know, i think the jury is out on health care. i was a bit. i mean, we've got 29 republica governors that are going to be speaking with a very loud, probably more unified voice that we've heard in a long time. you've got really strong policy leaders like governor barbour and jindall and donnell and others and perry who are taking
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the lead in trying to sort of unify that group and speak with one voice. and so, you've seen a lot o-- using the governors consulting with speaker boehner and others in congress. i do think they're going to play, you know, a more forceful role. it's interesting on health care as you've got governors that campaign certainly this year against, you know, against a health care plan, either repeal or reform. and so, they have to prepare to implement on one track while, you know, also continuing to fight it on another track. and so, you know, that's a challenge that's going to be interesting to see how that plays out and i'm not sure how it will. >> phil, just to follow up, was health care come without a law in any any of the races?
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>> absolutely. i think, you know, more importantly, you know, someone described the election to me as more of a restraing order on obama's policies. and, you know, i think taken as a whole, you know, health care was an issue certainly in certain states. cap-and-trade was a big issue that maybe was somewhat underreported, especially in a lot of coal producing areas across the country. it was a big issue in our race flashier in southwest virginia in the rota valley and on down into the ninth district of virginia. but overall, you know, it was the economy ad lack of the confidence of the economy. i think the wrong track number going on election day was 67%, which is the highest percentage in the last five years of midterm elections.
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and then spending. you know, the presdent's ovall approval rating was i think nationally around 43% going into the election were the democrats were able to hold onto governors races, was in those areas for the president's approval rating was five, seven, 10-point, you know, about sort of the national average. >> well, i think were just about out of time,ut i wanted to really give a gracious thank you to nathan, phil, duto, craig for putting the panel together. i think we learned not just a lot about what happened on election night, but what results will mean. i think were in for a pretty entertaining but newsworthy couple of years. >> it's always entertaining. >> yeah, thank you. >> thank you. [applause]
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>> gang, we've got about five minutes here is people need to check their crack very and then were going to start the ne [inaudible conversations] [applause] >> thank you, folks. appreciate everybody sticking around here. we're going to shift the topic you're a little bit. obviously we were doing some analysis on the races but the rga and the dga and were not going to focus in on what worked and didn't work. i was kind of fascinated that you could spend 200 million of your own money and not get a leg to it, proving that the candidates and the message really does count. it's not all money. so hopefully the senate got that message as well. i wanted to introduce our next
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speaker here, chris cillizza. houston is the number of times it does. i was very entertaining. if you want to be really entertaining you should go to youtube, enter chris cillizza base camp bp debate night on youtube and it's kind of disturbing. but very funny. he's appealing to the younger audience there. [inaudible] [laughter] >> seriously, it's very funny. chris runs a weblog called the fix for the "washington post." i'm sure many of you have seen it. if you haven't, you need to. and during the campaign season he runs a commentary called the friday light which is looking at the top 10 races at least according to hand and what's interesting about them and why. so you've been deeply involved with all of these races and paying very, very close attention to what worked and what didn't work. and so, in the past were the
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best thing to do here is to let chris grip on his observations and then use that to stipulate discussion. he's very good at the q&a and very engaging. so let's let them take it from here. thanks, chris. >> thank you, sir. all right. so, i guess i won't talk for long because the president sitting here anything. does everybody say that? i won't talk for long. they probably do. bill clinton. and finally -- [laughter] anything until i'm sure covered a lot of it. but i would say is this is true at the gubernatorial level and the senate level, too. i think what we saw affirmed last tuesday, which i always think it literally feels like six months ago. i don't know why. it's like time stretches once the election is because it was not very long ago. i think what we saw is candidates in the campaign really do matter in statewide
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races. .. i have a tendency to boil these things down to how much money you raise, who you know. that is all fine, but if there
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is no there there in the middle, that makes a huge difference. it mattered in a number of places here. it is not true broadly at the house level, by the way. are the are that's good enough i think you saw that happen a lot of places and in labrador we got elected in idaho should not have won the primary did nothing in the general election who did everything he was supposed to do. it matters less in-house candidates or less money is spent than people pay less attention. it's more of a charlie cook said in the house a parliamenry style collection. it has nothing to do with the two candidates. i would say the what the gubernatorial level the candidates do matter.
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i was thinking about campaign and candidates i thought were good. there's always less i think that our good them are bad. that is a depressing thing about politics but i think sometimes you see a kind of race to the bottom. i don't know if you watch the nv samet debate. i have to. they pay me. the only reason i did watch it and it was really not good. you were kind of like i can't believe these people are going to serve. harry reid i think is an able politician i think even his biggest allies would say he's not super telegenic or charismatic so i think there were some bad campaigns. i do think there were good campaigns and i was writing them down and it's funny a lot of the good campaigns this may run counter to the point i made i thought one of the best campaigns in the country was ted strickland and ohio. i thought he did a lot of things right. he was in a very difficult
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situation, 400,000 jobs lost in the first four years as governor. the industrial co midwest, very difficult for democrats to win when as was proven here but i thought he did a lot of very good things i thought they prosecuted the case against john quite well in the long run came up short think he ran a pretty credible campaign himself. it wasn't a huge disparity like i would say with harry reid a great campaign. other people and trying to remind myself. i thought scott walker was good in wisconsin. he's the republican. he ran a smart outside campaign, good ads. this goes to show conventional wisdom isn't or smartness isn't all contained within the bounds of washington.
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he had a firm -- immediate firm didn't do political tv, something i don't forget the name of it but it's like red box or something it made me think of those places you get the disease, something like that. his ads were quite good. he ran a campaign the brown bag campaign. he brings his lunch to work every day, drives like a 19922 leota silica, this whole idea that government spends too much and we need to rein in, really good, smart message. i would say especially, who lost to him ran a pretty good campaign. look, it is an odd campaign, but jerry brown did a pretty good job. he kind of tit -- looker, when you're running as someone who married a multibillionaire in a state like california in which tv -- there's lots of states where there is diminishing returns. it's like how much money can you spend on television i know what? as hillary clinton and barack
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obama proved the answer to that is lots. but i do think -- look, i will use my home state of connecticut. there's only so much money you can spend. you can buy a lot of new york tv and reached the southern part of the stick and spend billions of dollars. linda mcmahon is going to have spent 50ish million dollars. but there is no amount you can spend to get diminishing returns in california. talk about $5 million a week, try more than that, to run any significant statewide television , for get and direct mail, a conservative, hispanic radio, which she did. she did everything literally you could possibly do. and i think jerry brown, it's hard to run against that because you are running against somebody you run 10,000 pints of tv, she can run 20,000 points of tv, you run 20,000, she can run 40,000. so i think that he's smart we tried to shrink the campaign and he took a lot of criticism for
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that. he's not doing anything, she's winning, it's a disaster. he shrank the campaign because he figured i can't match her and money left but we need to have a short campaign so that i can match her as much as i can on television but some help for waiver of their which he needed and i think ultimately meg whitman didn't turn out to be as good candidate -- -- obviously i am by bias here -- we are not important, everyone ignores us. it is hostility at times toward the press, and there's a great youtube clich if you are at youtube looking at my idiocy you should also search meg whitman, there's a time she does a round table at e-business -- some kind of like green jobs please come
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and reporters clearly think that when this is over with reporters mostly go to events not because they care deeply about green energy jobs necessarily, but because they want to have a chance to address the candidates especially in california where you don't get as much access. and the meg whitman people didn't want her to ask questions so the shepherd and greet escort out of the room but then somebody, god bless the flipcam, they are like she has to go to another event. she's just like standing in the other room and then they put up a screen to block her so that they couldn't. so those kind of things i didn't wear well or they don't give her the benefit of the doubt when it comes to the media. you know, i think in california it may matter a little bit less because it is such a television state and you just spend oney on tv and it didn't wind up being enough. i think california proved that even in a year like this which is a wonderful year for the republicans nationally and is still very, very hard to get elected as a republican. you know, i would point at
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arnold schwarzenegger but let's be honest he wasn't elected as a republican he was elected as a celebrity. elected kind of it would be cool to have that guy as governor, not because they believed in the principal he espoused. many republicans say he doesn't espoused republican principles. so i think it's difficult to get elected but i do think jerry brown does deserve to have credit for the campaign he ran. courts seals i have. i thought blonden was good and nevada. hispanic federal judge that harry reid gave to make sure he never ran for office. do you run for office? i mean i think he is a star and solve a lot of republicans elected. i don't know how much skill and meeting talked about this but the governors level he saw a lot of republicans elected to lie still and will play a prominent role in the national party.
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susan martinez, the first latino woman ever elected, very good campaign, very steady, very solid rga helped her in the primary, smartly to get to the primary financially, and i think she will be nicky hailey won by a smaller margin than i think a lot of people thought she would ultimately -- my wife is a field hockey coach and there are ultimately no moral victories. the d of the year it doesn't feel like 8-4 and three we should have won. laughter could either says 8-4 or 11-7. you can argue but i would put -- you have jindal has gotten into the but maligned after his response to the press in 2009 it wasn't particularly good but i would point back to lots of
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people that have given poor response is. the only people who watch that are people like us. regular people, my parents consider now, my parents barely watched the speed of the union. i don't think they watch the other party's response. we have a tendency to overlook those sorts of things like the think that there is a lot of interesting talent coming up particularly on the republican side and the governors and some very able people. sign going to stop because i would rather take your questions and continue to meander. but if you have questions on anything i will take them. >> i will ask the first one, chris. you are a very wide savvy guy and leveraging the aspects of the digital and social media. to talk about the web campaign and the youtube fata. which candidate do you think really leverage digital and social media well and to their advantage, the past go around, always going clever stuff? >> but question. i think some of it is difficult
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because everyone was trying to do -- i think the social media became the internet of the 2010 campaign. and 06 and 08 or in 04 we've got to get on the internet. we've got to do internet fund raising and so i think everybody was trying to do lots and lots of that. so no one frankly stood out. the one that stood out and i don't know if this for good or bad at the gubernatorial level, charlie did a lot of good things through davis with some viral with stuff and i don't know whether there was good, bad or indifferent. i mean, demon sheep -- if you ask random people who follow politics a little bit, that's probably the thing they remember most about the campaign. i mean, it was like a phenomenon again, i don't know for good or bad. i guess i would say rather than a specific thing the thing i learned as i used to be a recovery dismissive of wed videos, like, you know, it is a
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press release basically that they put in video and they would always say you know, people pitch me stuff to read about and say we've got this web video coming out and i like, they cost you like $100 to produce it and it's not the same thing. it's not the false equivalent to a tv ad in which you're putting thousands and thousands of dollars behind in focus group etc. i would say that clearly during this campaign, there is the possibility for those with the videos to have a genuine influence on the debate that the way in which information now moves through twitter and facebook and every other, you know, thing out there socially, they do have power. you can't ignore them in the way that i once did. so that's kind of a lesson i learned. i'm trying to think there's anybody -- look, whitman -- it wouldn't surprise you the people better self funded did the best/most on media, they did the
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best/most of the singles. when you spent 200 million or -- the last time i checked she was at 142 million of her own. i assume it's going to go we more than that but it's all said and done. when you spend $140 million of your own money on a two year campaign, you do everything well. and from a kind of tactical perspective. linda mcmahon, same thing. use and $50 million on the senate race you're going to do it pretty well. i thought rick scott did a lot of good things, again, because he spent $60 million of his own money. so i'm not sure that any -- i'm not sure that tells us anything all that valuable other than if you have a lot of money you can do almost anything and hire smart pr. that doesn't tell about smart media. every candidate now has a twitter handle. every candidate has a facebook page. does that matter any meaningful way? i'm not there yet. i think it matters to a small number of people. it seems to me like everybody announces everything viet water
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now. nancy pelosi announced she was running for the minority leader over twittered. steny hoyer announced he was running for cover he's running for, minority whip, michele bachman dropped out of the conference chair grace via twitter. so i think it's something as a reporter you have to stay tuned in on but i'm not sure that it is a persuasion technique just yet. i know its name but i still think the best thing you can do for your candidate is -- is this on television? will this be broadcast, by the way? okay then i won't swear. so, you raise a lot of money and do everything they can to put it on television. i mean, i know that's still, leading ultimately -- why did rick scott in the florida governor's race? because he spent a lot of money on television. a lot of money, as did the rga, as did the vga and alex sink. that's why he won. he was able to find thousands and thousands of dollars in television ads in a state in which television ads are a massive persuasion tool. so in some ways i feel like it
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is a the more things change the more they stay the same kind of deal. it's cute and interesting and helpful at the margins to be a social media. i did you have to play in that the world, but it's just like i would say for my journalism, ultimately if what i did is right semi pithy things on it would hurt it might not mchugh a successful journalist, it might make you successful on a twitter person but there has to be something they're ultimately. >> a number of key senate and gubernatorial races this year became a three-way race is, colorado, florida -- do you think this is kind of a onetime phenomenon or is this a trend we are going to see going forward? >> yeah, it's a really good question. because if you look at -- you know, if you ask people which party do you identify with, the fastest growing by far is unaffiliated, which, i mean it's not a party, but you get my
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point. you know, only one independent, only one house, senate or governor's race and that's lincoln chaffee. i don't know he would have won rhode island had they not got in a huge fight with the current president of the united states a week before the election. it's never a good thing in this did the president won 62% of the votes to get in a fight when the swing vote in the state between you and your opponent is a book. so, only one. eliot in may and came close, finished second. he almost won. the hard thing for me is i think what -- you know, we've seen success in the past, angus king got elected as dependent and whatever party, u.s. reform party of lincoln minnesota. we've seen kind of this happen here and there. the thing for me i think is that it would have to happen at the presidential level think before
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we saw a real extended trickle-down. i think there are certain states, minnesota is one, mean is another where there's a history of kind of an independent candidate being taken seriously. but i think until you see the presidential level i don't know that it will be any more than kind of drops in -- you know, kind of random occurrences, as opposed to there's a real party. because i think people like the idea of a third party because they are sick of democrats and republicans, but of course if there was an actual third party that had a set of core beliefs and the platform they were running on other come to other parties that are bad, it would aim at the people called the conundrum, it's like you have this party but by having the parcel kirsanow there are some people who don't agree with that and they go somewhere else. so i think there is a desire for it. i think you need some of the presidential level to do it and form a party and i don't know who that would be. and obviously i think the most likely thing is for it to be an
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extremely wealthy person because that's the way that you run the fast advantages that the parties have in terms of organization and just like basis of getting your name on the ballot and all these things that matter and that take time and energy and money. so if you need a wealthy person to go out there and say i'm starting this party with iran when president or not i'm going to fund this for the extended future and no one really does that because it's usually a personality, the ross perot, and i think that's part of the problem. there are people who could do it financially. michael bloomberg. i don't know if running is the defender of the business community is a platform that works in an environment like this. but i would say to need someone who wants to invest not only in
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their own candidacy but if they come up short to invest in a broad attempt to build it. i've just seen lots and lots of these things kind of go by the wayside. i think we will continue to see -- it's most likely we will continue to see occasional appearances in which an independent candidate is able to break through a three-way race and win with 39% of the vote of the state, particularly states that are more open to that sort of thing where there is a history of it, you know, where the two-party structure is not as strong. i always thought it was funny that people thought dagget in new jersey could win last year. new jersey is the most, you know, the two parties in the party infrastructure is like they are very powerful, it's a very organization based state. the idea that someone could run that is hard to believe and in minnesota or mean or even rhode island for an example. so i guess i'm skeptical because i feel we've been down this road before if you look at the number
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of unaffiliated and think why don't we have a party? the affiliate's don't fit in one party. >> thank you for coming. i am an ohio constituent and i also work for the senator voinovich, and obama came to ohio 12 times this past election as well as clinton and joe biden. how do the work on their 2012 to improve that? >> i'm sure that nei thing and still debated who won on -- because they naturally both could make a little bit of a case. i think myself and many other people including many republicans expected them to be over 40. they are at 29 and probably stay at 29 in terms of seats they control. but on the other hand and this goes to the ohio question this isn't a majority thing. you know it's not like the house
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and the senate. it's not all governors races are created equal. some just a matter more. i'm from connecticut so i will put connecticut in there. connecticut doesn't matter as much as texas or pennsylvania or illinois or certainly a high your florida. it just doesn't. big states matter more, especially big swing states that is slated to either gain or lose seats in redistricting. ohio fits all of those things. it's clinton lose two seats probably in redistricting to the governor's office matters there. and it's a huge swing state at the presidential level. look, i always say this, the president doesn't randomly go places. people are like it's kind of quality went to go in for tom. he's going there because they think they can win. they went into all how you as much as they did because they understand how important it is. it was a state that went for him obviously in 2008 and bush in 2004 and remember we were fighting for them i still
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remember john kerry people we can still win and you're down by 100,000 votes. he's not going to just pop around. [laughter] that was my favorite thing. two times in the post election a bag of uncounted votes were on found. that is the word that was used, bag. how she is that? in connecticut in the governor's race that turned in a whole bag of votes they found a whole bag of votes. that's a total sidebar. i think that, you know, the problem for the president, and i don't think 2010 is necessarily -- in 2010i can't get reelected. to me, they are separate things. that doesn't mean there are not concentric circles and i would say the two biggest problems the president is themselves if i was the president's team, one is the struggle among independent of the party. use all democrats won independent by 18 points in 2006. president obama won them by eight and they lost by 18 nationwide.
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it was a vast loss, and there are places. portman running easily in the senate race he won independent by 49 points. that's stunning. lee fisher didn't from a good campaign. there's a lot of -- 39 points is a lot in a swing christianson that's one independent and the second i would say is the industrial midwest is a problem for them ohio, west virginia, pennsylvania, parts of new york, illinois, iowa isn't really the belt but it's not a great. pete did the kind of manufacturing belt is a big problem in a high of at the heart of it. i think they lost southern ohio badly. charlie wilson lost in southern ohio, who a month before it was a month ago i would be like you might want to keep an eye on charlie wilson but i don't think he lost 12 house seats to zero.
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they lost every competitive house seat with the exception of one and was a wealthy guy who had some kind of a republican running come out about a month before the campaign and he lost. but had that not happen i think he may have won about six seats. so, you know, if you're the white house and look what happened in ohio you have to be very concerned. it doesn't mean the president is not going to win ohio. we know what the presidential turnout means. african-american turnout will be much tighter than it was this time. that would obviously help but they can't lose independent in a kind of reagan democrats the way they lost them this time. i would say the same thing for florida it's a different constituency but they can't lose florida -- they can't lose the kind of voters they lost in florida this time again. remember the president got elected with three ander 65 electoral votes. this wasn't a 272 electoral vote victory we have seen a out of a
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lot. he got elected out of a vast margin. so he still has room to give away a few of the north carolina, virginia, indiana kind of states and still win, but when you start losing big constituencies in big states like ohio and florida i think you've got to worry about it. >> i would say by the way john d. serves a lot of credit. there was a really good race actually. i think that was -- you can debate whether ohio or flora was the most important governor's race. i think ohio was. either one of them was a sports. just because you wind up losing it doesn't mean necessarily did anything wrong, the other day i just did more good.
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>> were there any surprises in terms of turnout among the various groups of females, hispanics, and was the president's strategy to increase turnout in the end, was that successful? >> you could argue both ways. i would say the answer to that is probably no. youth vote turnout dropped drastically which again isn't terribly surprising. if you have kids, you know. somebody once compared this -- i thought this was a good way to think about it -- he said the presidential election is like the super bowl, right? people who -- you may not care about football, but you watch the super bowl, right? a midterm election is like a midseason game between the lions and the packers. it's like if you like the alliance for the packers to probably watch it, right? if you really like football, you
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watch it, but if you are a casual fan there's no chance that you watch it. that's kind of a midterm election. just turnout drops. it just does. it dropped in pleases the were very difficult for democrats to win. use all older voters make up the larger percentage. those are people who are most skeptical about the health care bill. those are people who -- white older voters have always been barack obama's most difficult constituency, particularly in places like ohio, indiana, illinois, west virginia, pennsylvania, southern illinois. that's where he struggled the most. so those numbers went through the roof, the younger voters dropped. so as a result -- then you had the independent going domestically for the republican. so you combine those three things. i think republicans are going to wind up winning the overall votes cast for the house, by 546 points total.
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that's a significant victory. it's about the democrats one bogden 06. as a composition in the electorate clearly favored the republican party and favored the republican party and those people who were republicans who wanted to go out and vote it was a hell or high water kind of thing. they were going to vote no matter what. there was interesting things here and there. black turnout in carolina was very high. you saw joe wilson being a somewhat serious race in a district that's quite good. again, you saw nicky hailey when by not nearly the margin people fought and a lot of the was turnout. i don't know why to be totally frank i'm not sure why it was high. it is pretty standard across the board otherwise but i would say the attempt to recreate the baala coalition i think the white house and the dnc that they were never going to get all the way there because it's the super bowl versus the winans versus the packers.
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they didn't get close enough to mitigate some of their losses. >> we have time for another question. last question. >> i will ask it. so along that same line, chris. was there in the states of the gubernatorial level that you saw where the tea party really made a difference in the general election? obviously we know it made a difference a number of primaries, and that affected the general and maybe maine, but for their states besides maine where the tea party vote really helped drive the election one way or another? >> i think it helped drive and a couple of places based on the primary. colorado, you know, i'm not convinced that scott was going to win that race anyway. but when he was in the nominee, dan maes was, then you have tom tancredo who is a tea party-like
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candidate running as the american constitution party. i think he took some of the vote. i would say it seems to me less obvious in the governors' races than it does in the senate races. i think part of that is just because what 80 doherty is based on is reduce federal spending, shrink the size of the federal government. it is less relevant in the governor's race than when you're in electing someone for the senate or the house. i think that said, republican candidates benefited broadly from the energy and enthusiasm in the tea party movement on election day than the most important thing this is so clich i remember watching tv the last week before the election and they say it's going to come down to the turnout. of course it is. laughter could that is the most obvious thing in the world. so, the person who gets the more votes is going to be the person who wins. okay, deep analysis. but, you know, i think it has to do with how the composition of the electorate and basically you
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had republican candidates benefiting from the fact that the tea party was very energized and willing to come out and vote for whatever candidate -- or voting against and a lot of ways, the democratic candidate. i'm not sure they were voting for the republicans, but republicans benefited in the fact it is a by a very -- by mary choice. if you don't like a contador voting for b. you may not like b and the polling would suggest people didn't like b or at times they are historically low levels but when the choice you decide you're not voting for when you're voting for the other by nature so i think the tea party helped to but i don't think they cost the republican party seats in a way that on the gubernatorial level i think you can point to certainly in delaware. you can see everywhere else whether, like sharron angle
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wasn't a particularly good candidate so i'm not sure they had agreed option. i'm not sure if chey norton, lisa murkowski is going to win in alaska even though joe miller be heard in delaware clearly it cost them a seat. mike castle was going to win, christine o'donnell was not going to win. there's nothing at the gubernatorial level i look at that says that cost them a race. colorado is the closest thing but scott wasn't to a candidate. on the level more on the candidate picking a level of the gubernatorial side. >> thanks chris. >> thanks, guys. [applause] spec all right, gang.
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it said. hopefully you find this helpful and interesting. don't forget to check out his blog. i making the plug as hard as i khanna. gough to youtube. we will see next week on the rga in san diego and of course the dga at christmas, which is the key d.c. event that is what, december 1st? yes, december 1st. thank you very much for coming and see you all soon. [inaudible conversations]
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>> congress returns on monday. work is expected on the bush era tax cuts as well as federal spending for the next budget year. watch the house on c-span. when the senate reconvenes for business on monday, possible legislative work includes bills on natural gas and electric vehicles. as well as wage equality and modernization of the food and drug administration. watch the senate live on c-span 2. january will bring the opening of 112th congress, with republicans assuming majority of the house. before that, party leadership elections. in the house, republicans will select the new speaker on november 17. democrats will choose the minority leader the next day. in the senate, both republicans and democrats will vote on leaders on november 16. stay tuned to the c-span networks for continuing coverage.
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>> next, a look at the influence of the tea party on the next session of congress. then a discussion on the salaries of federal employees. after that, supreme court oral arguments in arizona christian schools tuition organizations bursa's wiorganizations vs ngyu. >> the market was opaque enough that nobody could see that the way you can see it in the stock market. because of the way these instruments were, you are not betting on real mortgages, but on the casino version of a mortgage. >> in 2003, she wrote about enron in "the smartest guys in the room." now she will talk about her new
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book, "all the devils are here." >> now discussion on the impact of the tea party on the 112th congress. from today's "washington journal," this is 45 minutes. host: for those who may not know what is alter net t is a website founded abo founded about 14 years ago by my executive editor and co-edor on my recent book. it about the teaarty movement. we cover all kinds of things, everything from what is going on in terms of popular culture and mitts. we are an aggregator of something that began as a syndicator of progressive news media material to go out to progressive media. we are now doing it the other
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way where we are assimilating what we call the best of the progressive web but we have a full staff of editors and writers who produce original material. host: since you write about the tea party we will focus on that. what do you think their role will be in the 112th congress if what will their role be to them and those like yourself how do you see them influencing the work of congress? guest: it is very interesting when you look at how people who are used to covering congress see the tea party movement and say they are going to be a problem for the republicans because the republicans won't be able to legislate at all with t without, you know, raising the hack ma -- hackles of the tee party crowd but if you look at what is going on inside the republican party that is what their aim is, is to put on notice the republic
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establishme establishment, to let them know that if they don't go the way the tea party wants them to, that they will face primary challenges in their upcoming races. the establishment candidates will. so, even though they may not have the numbers of the majority of the republican caucus, they have enormous power. host: so, in the issues that this congress will take on, specifically in the 112th, what is the most concerning as far as the tea party's influence on how republicans will work? guest: there is great push to repeal the healthcare reform bill. of course they won't be able to do that. i sat in a workshop done by the americans for prosperity foundation not long ago and they are a group that organizes tea party folks on the ground. and the president of the group basically said what we really want is obama to have to veto a repeal bill at least three
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times, you know. so, they will put it as the poison pill on things and try to make him veto it and use it as a campaign issue in 2012. so that is a big one. earmarks is a huge one. freedom works is another group that organizes tea party folks. they put out an e-mail just yesterday saying that earmarks is the number one thing, that more of congressmen or congresswomen earmarking things in their state. it works both ways but it is hard to see how projects actually wind up getting funded in some ways without the earmarking process. so, it is a complicated issue. host: as far as the house being what it is, the house is still in democratic hands much
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guest: nominally. host: what happens within the body of the senate especially with the tea party and other republics try to put forth an agenda and it meets the senate controlled by democrats. guest: what is so interesting about the senate, pedro, even though the margin of wins was not for the republicans, was not what they got in the house side, actually i think the tea party caucus will have even more control in the senate even with democratic leadership than it will in the house. that is because the arcane rules of the senate allow a very small number of people to control what makes it to the floor. mitch mcconnell, the senate minority leader, is very much on notice by jim demint, who is sort of the de facto head of the tea party caucus within the senate, that if he transgresses
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that tea party crowd his establishment decades, the g.o.p. candidates he backs in any forthcoming races, will be challenged in primaries. host: adele tan is our guest until -- stan is our guest until 8:30. if you want to ask her questions about the congress now is the chance to do so. 202-737-0 202-737-00012 for democrats guest: i would say she was probably the most effective speaker on legislation that we have had in recent memory. what is said about inside
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game. she wins every vote she brings up pretty much because she knows how to count votes. she doesn't bring votes up until she has the votes. she is a great person at assembling the deal. she doesn't have the most charming public personality and that has been used to great effect by other opponents. i think personally it could be a good thing she stays in the role that she has. because this is going to be an incredibly oppositional house and you need a really tough fighter and she's prove she has the tough. host: when she says that we didn't lose because of me, is that true to you? guest: i think that is true. i think that democrats lost the house because they did not tend
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to their base, because the president did not appear to be standing on the same message that he campaigned on, which meant that he did not turn out the same numbers of folks who expected much broader change than they got. now whether it was realistic given the circumstances of the first two years, but i think this white house has suffered big problems in its messaging and framing of issues and its belief in conciliatory rhetoric when you have an opposition that is just determined to stop you regardless of the merits of what you are putting forward. host: as far as leadership is concerned there are reports saying if all shakes out the way it does if pelosi is the minority leader steny hoyer is the whip and jim clyburn a third
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position what do you think about this, i guess, not battle but this discussion that has been going on the last few days about leadership and how the new democratic leadership will shake out in the house in guest: from a political point of view i think it is very smart because the democrats have a very broad and complex coalit n coalition. to keep clyburn in the leadership, he wasn't going to be able to compete for the post that it likes likes -- it looks like hoyer will have. it is critical to holding that coalition together. clyburn is much more progressive than hoyer so you get the progressives. he is also an african-american. it is very important, i think, at this point in what is going on culturally in our country to have an african-american in leadership in the democratic caucus in the house.
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so i think politically it is quite smart. it is going to be interesting to see what it does for precedence going forward as power changes hands as it inevitably will, will the republicans maintain that model. host: if speaker pelosi is the phaoerpbt leader what is the -- minority leader what is the most effective thing she can do? guest: put forward legislation that is progressive in nature -- i'm a progressive so that is what i would like to see. but i also think that will be rejected. but that is clearly designed and articulated to help people who are struggling in this economy. host: first call for you sun prairie, wisconsin on the democratic line. scott is on. caller: good morning, everyone. yes, your guest i'm not sure which republican party she is
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being funded party but the tea party is just strictly nothing more than the right wing pushing even farther to the right, being supported by the koch brothers, you have karl rove and the only mission is stop this president, stall everything he does and win 2012. it is just about power. they don't care about the american people or jobs. these tea partiers are crazy. even rand paul in kentucky already said he is going to take earmarks for the state of kentucky. so the tea party is crazy. i don't know what these people are thinking and that is all i have to say. thanks for taking my call. guest: i have tkodone ex-sensie reporting on the influence of the koch brothers and the tea party movement and charles and
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taeufrd koch are the -- david koch are the executives of koch industries which is the largest or second largest privately held company in the united states depending on the source you cite and they have furnished a number of right leaning institutions including americans for process part and americans for prosperity foundation, which has done a great deal to organize tea party folks on the ground and to gin up opposition to the healthcare reform bill and energy reform.
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we don't all get our news from a common source. not everybody is watching c-span. so people are working off what i would call a post-fact environment and they're operating with that information, whether it's that information or not. >> even with the majority of sources now available through the internet as we've seen as an influence? >> yes. because we're also selecting. and we choose media outlets that suit our biases. and i think a defining element of the tea party movement is more cultural than anything else. and if you see your culture
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reflected in a particular news media outlet, say fox news, that's where you're going to go. >> portland, oregon. you are next. allen, republican line. good morning. caller: good morning. guest: good morning. host: you're on with our guest, sir. go ahead. kiveragetsdz yes. my question was she was talking about how the tea party affected the g.o.p. as the republicans. but my question is about how the tea party is impacting the democrats and the progressives. up until, say, 2012 election. what kind of influence will the tea party have over them? it appears that in this election that the tea party was responsible for some of the 60 plus seats that were lost in congress. guest: that's a great question, caller. that really is. and i think what you're going to see is that, first of all,
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one of the things that progressives, the small light that progressives have that they see at the end of this tunnel is that in this current election, what that has yielded is a more progressive democratic caucus. so what the be pact of the tea party movement on progressives is that i think you're going to hear much more bold and boistrous progressive movement. the progressive movement has been put on notice. and one of the shortcomings of liberals and progressives, i think, as a movement is we tend to think when we've won something, we've won it. and the right does not operate that way. the right never concedes defeat. and it also is always playing a very long game. and so i think that a big
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lesson that was taken or that should be taken from what happened in the house is that you can't just -- once you elect somebody whom you think elbodies your values, you can't sort of cede your power to that person, whether it's the president of the united states, the speaker of the house, you have to keep pushing. so i think that you will see a more bold and boistrous progressive presence in american politics. >> host: starting from the president? guest: no. not immediately. now, with any luck, progressives can bring him their way. but i think it is in the nature of barack obama and i think it's really his fundamental nature as a human being to consillyate. i think he wants to -- he does believe his own rhetoric about consensus and moving forward and all of that. and i don't think that's
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possible with the congress he has. host: so is that ability a liability then? for him, politically. guest: i think in the context of the current environment he really needs to. and i would say, if you've got a congress that is bent on obstruction, in both chambers, then what is there to lose? in speaking to your really innate desires as they were expressed on the campaign trail, which was a very progressive message, a very liberal message. and the people just want help in this economy. and they want to believe that thing ks improve for them and they want to believe that jobs will be created. so make the proposal that you believe would create jobs. if the republicans shoot them down, let them be the ones who are against the american people.
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host: so let's look more short term. what should the president say about the discussion that's going to take place on tax cuts? guest: it's very disappointing what we're hearing coming out of the white house where the white house seems ready to accept an extension of the bush tax cuts for the highest income group at a time when we're talking, when there's the president's debt commission is talking about making cuts to social security for people who have been paying into the system all their lives. you know, and it's based on this false notion that somehow if you give a tax douth the very wealthy then they go out and create jobs. there's no evidence to really support that. so i really think that -- i think i and many other liberals and rogives would like to see the president reconsider that decision. now, he's in a perilous
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position because then he can be accused of forestalling a tax cut for the middle class because the republicans are insisting that you bundle it all together. but he can say, look, they're looking to deprive us of this amount of revenue because they want to enrich their rich friends. so -- and they're willing to put the fortunes of the middle class on the line for that. and i would like to see him go toward that. host: with 2012 in two years, is it a tipping point, these kind of decisions right now, especially going forward and the support he gets from progressives like yourself? guest: you're absolutely right. because 2012 begins in 2011. the election campaign begins really in january. so, yes, every single decision that he makes will be seen in that light.
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now, i think it's very important that he express his principles and not just be calculating what he thinks is going to get him reelected. but i would say that there's one thing that polls never give us, and pollsters take measures of how people's sentiment is on a given day on a particular issue. there's really no poll for how people feel about somebody who stands on principle in the face of polls that tell them to do opposite. and my sense is that people do respect that even if they might disagree with a particular isolated position. so i would say that there's nothing to lose at this point in an obstructionist congress to do that. host: dallas, texas.
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thank you for waiting. caller: good morning. guest: good morning. caller: good morning. everybody. one, i appreciate you saying that we're not crazy in recognizing that fact. because people are not crazy. we did not like the route that george bush took at the beginning. he was spending like a drunk sailor up there before 9/11. and then, after 9/11 and all -- you know, just the whole mess, then here comes obama on the scene. and then he's like bush on steroids. we can't sustain this economy or the way this country is going. and also, i want to
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counterpoint you talk about the coach brothers but you never -- cotch brothers but you never mention people like george cor well who is probably financing your outfit. and his reaches are so far it's like ab octopus. >> we'll leave thrit. ma'am. guest: well, first of all, george and his foundations do not fund us. but i think we would welcome his support any time he would like to come our way. i think there's a fundamental difference between the koch brothers and what they're doing. and may i say, in tandem with another billionaire, rupert murdock who owns fox news and the "wall street journal," and what george is doing in investing in liberal and progressive causes. and that is, if you look at who
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stands to be enriched by the agenda that the koch brothers and rupert murdock embrace, it's the koch brothers and rupert murdock. if you look at whose prosperity stands to be increased by the agenda embraced by george soros, it's a lot of everyday people and it's really not in the best interests of george soros' for tune to see a progressive agenda passed. and i would say they that that's a very significant difference. i would also -- you know, the raising of this notion of soros is an octopus as somehow distinct from what over very rich people do in funding institutions, ideological institutions, i mean, this is a line that's being advanced by glenn beck of fox news, in a
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very unfactual way, that is rife with antismetic smears che did just yesterday, i believe, in his most recent program. and i think that is really dangerous and poisonous. that's a very different thing than saying, well, if somebody is funding sometng that's going to enrich them. i think it's quite different to accuse somebody of having played a role in the holocaust when he was actually a victim of the holocaust. >> host: we have this off of twitter. guest: i don't think that's true. i really don't think that's true. because if you look at there's
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this myth that has been picked up in the echo chamber of mainstream media that we are somehow a center right nation. and that's if you take all issues ranging from foreign policy to domestic policy and put them all in a big blender and do some kind of aggregate that you might come wup that. but if you look at where people stand on domestic issues, issue by issue even people who define themselves as independents more often come down on the liberal or progressive side of things. i mean, the progressive change campaign committee commissioned a really interesting poll. and instead of just asking people, do you support cuts to social security or do you support -- and taking a poll on that specific issue. or do you support extending the bush tax cuts to the most wealthy. they asked people, giving them
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three choices, because the money is the poll's money. right? it's one pot of money more or less, what would they cut? and they said the three things they chose were would they extend the bush tax cuts to the most wealthy, cut social security, or cut the defense budget? and a very strong plurality came down on the side of extending -- of not extending the bush tax cuts to the most wealthy. only 12% said cut social security. and yet that's the trade-off we're being asked to make, and polls are not ordinarily done in that way where people are asked to choose what the trade-off would be. host: north carolina, gerard on our republican line. go ahead. caller: good morning. my question has to do with my
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observations of campaign signs this past election season. and what i did not see, i never saw the word republican, i never saw the word democrat, and i never saw the word liberals or progressive. the only words i saw were conservative or an independent voice for the people. and so that, to me, indicates that we are progressing more to the right, where even the labeled republican may be considered too liberal. and my question is, what do you take from those campaign signs where you just did not see the word, you will not see the word a liberal voice for the people or a progressive candidate, but instead at best you'll see an independent voice. guest: i think that's a great question. with regard to the use of the
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party labels on signs, i think there's a very clear reason for that. both parties are held in quite low esteem by the american people, as is congress. in terms of -- now, i don't have the empirical data and i spent my campaign season covering the tea party movement so i wasn't out there at democratic rallies or progressive rallies all that much. so i can't verify what the caller is saying about not seeing the words liberal or progressive, but i would say that democratic leaders have bought into a mainstream media narrative that says we are center right nation and that -- which would imply that these are not words that are going to appeal to the swing voters, the person who is not ideologically
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aligned who can vote -- who vote one way in one election and another way in the next. first of all, it's dispirting to the base, the people doing the work to get people elected, the people who call themselves liberal and progressives when that does not occur. also, it maintains this narrative that this is somehow bad people. and i think that the right has done a very, very good job of advancing an untruth that liberals and progressives are somehow big-time socialists veering on communist. let's go back to george soros. he helped take down i don't know how many communist dictatorships by promoting
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democratic activity in communist states. so i think it's very important for progressives and liberals to embrace what they are and put that -- put their names forward and create their identity. host: our guest for the next sten minutes or so, addie, with alternet. she is the washington bureau chief. you can find more about the information they put there and it's linked to our site. our next call, rosia from fort laudordale, florida, democrat's line. good morning. caller: good morning. i basically have a question or comment. i'm a black american christian, and over the past year i've been watching c-span and cnn, different news, and i've been looking at the american tea party, white americans, mostly
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older white americans and i see how they complain about everything in the government but they do not relate to other americans, african americans, asian, muslim, all the other americans that i tend to be around, especially went to school with. and when we get together and talk about the tea party, we agree to some extent of things they're talking about because we are americans, we don't want big government. but they don't relate to us. and we are younger americans, we are the future americans. and we don't like how they represent themselves. i remember watching a tea party , a parade or something and they had a picture of barack obama dressed as some sort of african something. and i have friends from africa that will sympathize. but they're fighting for american rights. you do not put down other race, other culture and other religions. and they claim to be christians. christians do not follow christ and do the things that the tea partiers do.
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but a lot of thing that is they say does not make sense. so this is why i don't understand. probably 80 or 95% of the tea party did thot vote for barack obama and he still won. so 2012 is coming around soon. they say race doesn't matter, but when they saw what happened in my community they say we've got to pay more attention. so i think it's going to be a big challenge in 2012 when you have to reelect because i think it's a rude awakening for the tea party. host: we'll leave it there. thank you. guest: well, i think that the caller gets at a fundamental tension that is happening in our politics and that is this notion of who is the real america? now, i would argue that that's a dangerous question to be asking. we're all the real america. we're all here. en we're all citizens and it is the diversity of our culture
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that has brought us such great riches. but i thk t this issue of culture is very, very important and race is part of that. a lot of i think tea party folks don't have a lot of eektspeerns -- experience of peer relationships with people from outside their own culture, and in urban areas of course we all have much more of that kind of experience, although it's not universal. we still all tend to cling to our own groups. but i think that this is a really critical question. and how the tea party addresses this within its own ranks, and it makes these token gestures of supporting certain african american candidates and recruiting them. it -- the tea party express
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named as its chairman once the -- mark williams who issued a very racist script against the naacp, was purged. they named a black man as their chairman. so there are attempts to refuture this perception through symbolism. but unless it's matched inward and -- word and deed, i don't know that they'll prevail. host: do you think there will be some type of challenge in 2012? guest: it's always possible. i mean, it's hard to see who might want to be responsible for harming the president at a moment that he is so power lines in the nation's future. host: win stom salem, johnny on our independent line. guest: caller: yes. i don't know, it's just -- i
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was a democrat most of my life until this last election. i have fought very hard to get george bush and his people out of office and then to get them into -- to get obama and axel rod and rahm emanuel, it was just like we didn't change anything. it didn't make any difference. i'm on social security, i'm a grand mother, and i was looking progressive thinks happening for my grandchildren. i'm black, and it's just horrible. this is a black president who has no respect for the black community. i'm looking on a computer every day that i can become part of to try to get him out of there. he is the biggest wimp i have ever seen in my life. he has no -- nothing that he believes in. if he believes in anything, he would stand for it and stick to it and fight for it. he has not.
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he is just -- him, emanual, axel rod and harry reid. hair re reid sounds like a little mouse, he acts like a mouse. he does everything and anything he can to get himself reelected but it was not in the best interest of the party. the public option, he let that baucus guy run with the thing. and he just let people run with the health care bill for 15, 18 months. that should have been stopped after three months. host: we'll leave your thoughts there and let our guest respond. caller: well, i'm hearing -- i can appreciate the caller's disappointment with some of the team that the president has assembled around him and it's old-style politics plays the old wray and it involves a lot of orchestrating and deal-making. but to say that bhome has not
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accomplished anything in the last two years i think is false. first, you have to consider the crisis, the incredible crisis of epic magnitude that he was facing as a result of the bush crash, and it's very hard to prove what didn't happen, what might have happened had certain actions not taken place. now, most economists say we needed a much bigger stimulus and i would agree with that, defering to their greater knowledge than mine. but nonetheless, the actions that were taken really did need to happen in terms of the stimulus, the banking, preserving the banking system, and keeping one of the largest manufacturing sectors that we have in our economy going, which was the automotive sector. so while i wasn't crazy about the ways in which those things happened, i think they're pretty critical.
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you have a new president looking for his way, and avoiding what could have been a collapse ot not only the count, but the global economy. guest: i need to ask a question on the tea party. the tea party has been around for centuries and it looked like it had died down. but all of a sudden it has sprouted up. not during the bush years, but all of a sudden when the other, president obama came on board, that's when the tea party sprouted up. and i notice that that's the special interest group for the republicans. so to say this, that the special intreast groups have more -- interest groups have
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more interest in the republican party but not for all the people who are the groups of income bracts. so they are just for one sector of interest of one race, not the whole different races of people. guest: well, there's a lot in what the caller is asking. what i think is very astute in what she said is that the tea party is not anything new. and i mean, she counts it back to centuries. i think in its present form what we can do is track it back to say the presidential campaign of barry gold water in 1964. the tea party movement is really the old new right dressed up in something new and bright and shiny. and this is the way the right
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works. and every time it comes up in a new incarnation, everybody thin it's something new. and we had the -- in 64 you had the goldwater campaign. and then by 78, 79 you had the moral majority which was created by the same folks who had run the goldwater campaign. and then that ran its course. and these sort of institutional entities that represent the right tend to have like a ten-year life span. and that died down, and then you had the christian coalition, and then that died down. and now you have americans for prosperity and freedom works. so i think the caller is correct in talking about the life span. where i think it gets complicated is about whether or
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not the tea party movement is representing a single class of people. what i see, what i think has happened is that these very big what we call astro turf groups, americans for prosperity and freedom works and other groups like that, have been quite brilliant in packaging a big business agenda in such a way to make small business owners think that somehow this is good for small business. and what i have seen, and this is just anecdotal. no pollster that i know has done the data on this, but i'd love to see it. i think a lot of tea party folks are small business owners or they work for small businesses. and so they're very -- so that means they do carry the burden of regulation in a way that big businesses don't. i mean, they feel it viscerally.
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they have to spend a lot of overhead in fige all the different forms that they need to file and they feel the tax burden quite acutely. now, that's not all the tea partiers. and, like i say, there is a cultural element to this. it's seeing people who are not like them are perceived to be making gains while they are treading water. and it doesn't really matter if the people who are not like them are not yet on a par with them economically, the point is that, hey, i'm treading water in a really scary economy and somebody else seems to be moving ahead from where they were. that's my perception. host: austin, texas. thanks for waiting. republican line. caller: good morning. and good morning to you ms. stan who has no idea what she's talking about. so what would be your opinion on this whole tea party republican deal?
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where would the issue stand on this whole big body scanner issue in the airports? and you know, the grotesque patdowns. and then if you decide to opt out, you are subjected to the entire turmoil of looking at you and being able to -- so where do we stand on that? should that be something that the tea party should be behind and sort of -- and should this be a republican thing? or should this be an altogether american sort of thing that we should figure out and get rid of? guest: well, it's an american thing. civil liberties, you know, the right and the republican party does not have the constitution doesn't belong just to them. it belongs to everybody.
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and we often make the mistake of thinking that we have no points of commonality with the opposition. and i think on the issue of sillints there are points of commonality. they just get played down in the political discourse because for political expedience. you don't see the astro turf groups that organize the tea party movement railing against the patriot act which was passed under george bush nor do you hear in the restric of more mainstream liberals a whole lot about that because the patetrot act is now embraced by barack obama. i think these are really critical questions for us to be asking on the questions of civil liberties. and what does it mean in termites of our constitution? which is, i believe, a living,
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breathing document but nonetheless guarantees us certain rights that are infringed by many of these measures. host: one more call. tennessee. bill on our democrat's line. caller: good morning. i'd like to ask your guest there the republicans passed the bush tax cuts through reconciliation. which means, i think, that it's not supposed to help the deficit. what i'm seeing on the media now is a tendency to group the tax cuts for the democrats with those tax cuts with bush. aren't they separate issues? i mean, can we lump it all together? and that's my question. guest: well, as i mentioned earlier, i do think that these two things should be separated. i truly do. i think that, and i think that
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the way to do that is for the president and the democrats in congress to really hold the line on this notion of extending these tax cuts. host: adele stan with alternet. and your book is called? > >>terence samuel identifies the new members to watch in the house and senate. martin klingst and robin harding
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discuss global economic issues and the g-20 meeting in seoul, south korea. washington journal at 7:00 eastern on c-span. next, a discussion on salaries of federal employees. then, a supreme court argument in an arizona christian school organization. after that, the traffic safety board forum on traffic safety and older drivers. see what people are watching on the c-span video library with the most recent tedious, most watched videos, and most share. it is on our homepage. you can view our continuing coverage of the midterm elections. watch what you want when you want. monday, a house ethics subcommittee holds a hearing to determine whether any of the 13 counts against york congressman
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charles rangel have clear and convincing evidence. the hearing begins at 9:00 a.m. we'll have live coverage on c- span3. now, a discussion of the salaries of federal employees. this is 30 minutes. "washington journal" continues. host: this is to shot of usa today. he as a correspondent -- dennis cauchon of "usa today." guest: i could have used 130,000, but i just picked a number which reflects taipei. i wrote one last year over $100,000. host: and this is for federal workers? correct guest:. host: tell us about those who make that much money. guest: doctors, lawyers,
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managers, security analysts. host: as far as the amount of people making that figure, how many people are we talking? guest: 82,000 of the 2.1 million or about 4% of the federal workforce makes $150,000 or more. around five years ago and was 7000 who made that many or 0.4%. and has increased tenfold in five years. since president obama took office it has doubled. host: is that natural as far as increases are concerned? guest: it has increased faster than private pay and inflation. there is a variety of reasons in how federal pay is set. there is not one reason but a variety. host: when you ask those in charge about the increases, what did they say about the rate of increase? guest: they say federal workers
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make less on average than private workers. this is an effort to break it up -- bring this up to private doctors. they say the mix of the federal workforce is different in the private work force. it is more educated, more skilled, on more chemists and ph.d.'s did you see in the private work force which is why there is an effort to make higher but comparable pay. host: what kind of reaction you getting from the government and those who read your stories? guest: we get a wide variety in a very strong, emotional reactions. it is across the board, as you would think. i tried to be dispassionate about it because there are two different questions. how much are federal workers making? how much should federal workers be making? people conflate the two. if you say someone is making $150,000, then there is a strong response without necessarily
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looking at the meaning of that and seeing what the workers are. host: the office of personnel management made a release in light of the report. this is what they said. "3% of federal workers make above $150,000. is that correct? guest: it is actually 4%. that is correct. as you know, the federal work force has a variety of people from police officers, fbi agents, coax, nurses. there are 56,000 nurses. earlier this year, to take a look at that, i looked at all of the federal jobs that were comparable to private jobs and about 60% of them are. job per job, apple per apple, federal employees make about 20%
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more than private workers. 40% of the jobs cannot compare because there is now irs agent or fbi agent in the private sector so those were excluded from analysis. host: we look to the analysis, what kind of groups are we talking about? the look of postal workers, look at those in various agencies? guest: the postal workers are excluded. if you look at them, they have been suffering significant layoffs. it includes civilian employees in the defense department, homeland security, veterans. it includes 2.1 federal civilian workers. host: our guest is with us until the end of this program. he has been writing about federal workers to make over $150,000. the numbers are on your screen.
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for those of you who are federal workers, we have set aside a line for you if you want to wait in this morning. that wine is 202-628-0184. we will take the calls in just a moment. when you calculate these. are we just looking at dollars? guest: correct. we just look at salaries and not benefits. host: when you add in benefits, what happens then? guest: it grows even more significantly. another department does total compensation, benefits and salary. it shows the average federal worker total compensation has increased 38% above the rate of inflation. and in the private sector it has gone up 9%. the gap has been growing over the last decade. host: when you put out reports
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like this, are there political components especially when there are talks about freezing federal pay? guest: definitely. one reason is topical is because how the conservatives and the tea party has made this an issue. there is a 1.4% federal pay increase on the table recommended by president obama. the republicans had been advocating freezing or cutting pay. it is very hot politically. host: to federal workers have a union or a representative to argue their case? guest: yes, they have a variety of unions and worker groups. a large share of the federal workforce has very talented, effective advocates. host: our guest is dennis cauchon of "usa today." on our independent line. good morning. caller: i am a federal employee
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that makes more than $150,000 per year. i have been in with the government 25 years. and turner in if you look at how you get to the point where we have so much -- internally if you look at how you get to the point where we have some much, when i the get so many other people like me in my organization who are making this much money and how there is this human psychology to how we promote within, it does not mean that we improve qualifications. we just end up kind of being at the happy place over a period of time. that is what we need to be working at, the inside psychology of how we get to the point where we make this much money and have independent reviews. and the most organizations if you look at the position descriptions and align them with the work they are doing, many times they are just selling political agendas and not just doing the work.
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i think we can cut the government down. i think we cannot lower the wages if we really want to be honest comparing the amount of work. we need to have a metric to measure if this is really a $150,000 job. is the taxpayer getting that much service? if it can come up with that matter, that i think you have a model for success if people understand why they need to cut wages. host: can give is a general sense of what you do? caller: i am a management analyst. i do in turnover of years, strategic planning, those types of things which are kind of templates. i am paid at gs-15 for what is in my head and the advice i can give it to a meeting, to manage risk, to underwrite plausible deniability if something goes on. that is what happens.
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am i producing something that i am proud of? it depends what agency were serving in. i serve the department of defense. in that case, i felt like i was really earning my money. there are other agencies where you just kind of manage policy, oversight, and things change faster than you can produce things but you are sitting there and you had people who are gs-14 and gs-15 who have not produced anything in years. host: these are the cables for january 2010. he was a gs-15. if he goes up to a step 10, the maximum, or at least if you go higher, it is $129,000. guest: people will look at the page tables, then you look at
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what they are paid, there are so many exceptions and the complexity that it often clouds the issue. host: exceptions such as? guest: being a physician, for example. the look of the data of what they actually are paid in does not match the schedule. in theory, i did not realize it was so low on that. in theory, federal employees are matched -- maxed out at $153,000. in the reality, when they are paid does not always match that level. many employees are qualified for bonuses in this numbers. the numbers we have do not affect over time. host: for what he makes he does not think it is justified. guest: it is surprising. one in four is in his school of
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thought. you did not realize how fortunate we are. three out of four, the majority of the people sitting around, have quite a different view among federal employees. host: what about the master key was talking about with the valuation? what is the evaluation process for the government? are they different than the private sector? guest: they are extremely different. they are much more formulaic in the government. in the private sector, your job, my job, we do not have steps and we are not labeled gs-9 or whenever. it is a narrative or merit. in the federal pay, you hit the markers and you get the raise. it is very input based on your education and other things. what you and i do is based on output. how good was your interview? how did you look on tv? that is a key difference.
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host: washington, d.c., on our democratic line. caller: what percentage of the workers when you look at gs-1 to gs-6, not even in that salary range, most of those individuals, there are jobs set aside so you do not automatically get promoted. you could be in position at gs-1 and make a minimum salary for six years. you do not automatically go up to the next step when you have the expertise. what percentage of the people who are making from the gs-1 to gs-6 -- of the majority of the jobs?
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they're required to have expertise beyond what is the norm in the government. that is how they come up with the additional -- host: canasta a question? how many years does it take to move up a step? caller: normally, the first step you can go from 1 to 2, and those are yearly steps. after that it is every two years than every three. host: think you, caller. -- thank you. guest: of the top of my head, i cannot remember how many were gs-1 to gs-6. the average was gs-11. the largest chunk of workers is gs-9. host: a grade 6 starts at $
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30,577. if he were to make it to step 10, it is $40,000. guest: there are no federal employees basically in earning less than $30,000. the lower end has come up dramatically. the very top end, a doctor, is making somewhat less than the private sector counterpart would be. if you are a cook in the federal prison, you could be making double. the group -- the blue collar jobs do better than the private sector than the a petroleum engineer which would make more in the private sector. host: the office of personnel management said the average worker made about $74,000.
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in the 2005, the average was about $61,000. is there anything in those numbers that you want to add to? guest: that is quite possibly correct. the numbers i tried to use our from the bureau of economic analysis which includes a bonus, over time, etc. what happened to thousand nine from 2009 is -- what they have from 2009 is about $81,000. it is a very complex system with a lot of strings. host: another federal worker from washington. go ahead. caller: i have been listening to this debate for the past week or so about pitting one group against the other. i was a federal employee. i started working in the postal service and was making $3.25 per hour back in 1970.
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i worked my way up. i got my degree and became a postal inspector. you are then transferred at least three times. every time you are transferred you lose. i had to get another house. the money that i made was good money. i am not complaining about that. the private sector was making a lot more than what i was making. we had to go on to college campuses to try and get young graduates to come in to the service, to federal jobs, and they would not do it because they said they could make money in the private sector. it is ironic that everyone is beating up on federal employees now because the economy took a downturn. i think it is unfair. federal workers deserve what they make. i know i deserved what i made. i probably should have made a lot more, but i did not. i am not complaining what i did make. thank you very much.
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i listen to your comments offline. guest: i do not know that much about postal service other than they have huge unfunded pension liabilities that may break them this year or next. i think the caller said he was retired now? host: how hard is it to get a job in the federal government? guest: it is hard. it is a long process. it is very competitive. on the other hand, the federal government is hiring. there have been 100,000 or so jobs in the last year. the private sector is now adding jobs again. host: dallas, texas, on our republican line. caller: thank you. good morning. this is very important information that the country should have.
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it exposes the outrageous numbers and size of federal pay. we all know the federal government is nothing but a drag on the private sector. the vast sums of money that are now going in to pay for workers that really provide such little productivity and value to society as a whole, you know, this is an outrage. if we were to do a comparison now that we understand what the pay scales are for various workers, we should look at what the pay scales are relatively in much earlier decades before we had this expansion of federal bureaucracy. this is what is strangling our country. i hope with the future direction of policy with the expulsion of
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the obama administration from washington we will be able to basically cut the size and scope of these workers and their pay scale. in excess, i think we could cut 50%-60%. i want to commend you for bringing out the actual details, showing the pay scale, showing the size, scope, and numbers of these workers. i think this is a very important thing for america to see. i would like to hear any comments you may have about whether these pay scales are in any way justified. guest: the caller is getting into the question of what the federal workers should be paid. looking at what they are paid in the broad perspective, federal compensation costs about two under $50 billion per year, roughly 10% of that -- $250
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billion per year, 10% of the budget. the proposed pay raises would add another $3 billion starting january 1st. host: they want to reduce congressional and white house budget by 15%, freezing federal salaries, bonuses, and compensation for non-defense agencies for three years for a savings of $15 billion, cutting the federal workforce by 10% to save $13 billion. is this possible to do? guest: only time will tell. there has been a lot of proposals in the past, but the political climate is a lot different. a freeze probably has a pretty good chance this year. there are other more radical proposals and cuts. a 10% furlough for federal workers have more of an uphill battle. host: if you're asks how you divide it public contractors from federal employees?
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guest: this does not include private contractors employees. data is not available on them. in general, they tell me anecdotally that private contractors make a whole lot more than they do. host: because? guest: because they contracts and issue these lucrative contracts and the pay is very high. in the argument, it seems if you would look at who is leading the federal government -- leaving the federal government, the departures are very low. it is a fraction of what happens in the private sector and even lower during this economic downturn. you would naturally think if pay is low that people would slowly moved to comparable jobs with higher pay. the flow is generally in the other direction. there could be other lifestyle choices. host: our guest for the next 15
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minutes is dennis cauchon. new jersey, thank you for waiting. caller: thank you. i have a question. one of the first statements the guesstimated was that this $150,000 salaries doubled under president obama. i wanted to know why, first of all. secondly, when you compare the private sector and the pay of $150,000, to me it seems irrelevant because what is the average price for a home? i think the point is that the private sector is not paying people enough to buy a home or to take care of their family. guest: it is the number of
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employees making more than $150,000 that doubled since president obama took office. even that is a little unfair to president obama because these things are already in place. it is not like he just hit a button to pay them more. in the first 18 months, he can attribute that to policies under george bush. after he leaves office, his policies will linger for the next couple of years. host: members of congress, according to the congressional research service, they make $174,000. the speaker makes $223,000. the majority and minority leader have a salary of $193,000. caller: good morning. i would like to directly address some of your callers who are begrudging government workers to
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make a living. i thought entering middle class was a virtue. the point i want to bring out is the mass of outsourcing of jobs, especially in the military, is part of the problem. a truck driver today in iraq is making $100,000 working for black water tax-free. the caller should be concerned about that and not the salary of a postal worker. this idea that we shall be begrudging workers for making a middle-class income, we should be talking about how to raise the rest of the workers who are stuck in low wage jobs. we should think of how they can unionize to raise their wages as well. we saw this with the autoworkers and the attack on union workers in detroit accused of making too much money. i thought aspiring to be middle- class was american and a good
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thing. we should change the conversation. how do we make sure we help with the rest of the work force that -- stuck in a low-wage economy? guest: this is not an attack on federal workers. it is a financial business question about how much they make. there is now meeting other than that. the financial meeting is important. you talk about the military which is important because a large share of the $150,000 plus employees are in homeland security and civilian defense department employees. five or so years ago, the military changed their personnel system to award merit pay. the result was explosive growth in salaries among the highest- paid employees. the people at the top for a little above average. conagra's, in the last session, ended the merit pay system. -- congress, in the last session, ended the mirek cave
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system. the national security personnel system is back to the traditional schedule. they are being moved back now. he wants to reward merit pay, but the actual execution is very tricky. host: does your work affect how much you make? guest: your locality affects how much you make. if you work in washington you would make more than rather if you lived in tulsa. host: caller from our federal worker line. caller: i have been a federal employee for 32,000 -- 32 years. i make $55,000 per year. we are not paid exorbitantly. the want to do the most work are the these paid. you are talking about salaries three times 94 people in these
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mine.- three times if the judge about jobs other than managing someone, there is no one who works for the government you can do three times the work i can. i am not that great of a worker. the liability the post office faces for its retirees, no government agency has been required to do that. that is why we are in the red for the most part. there are other reasons as well. now, i have three points i want to make. first of all, tax breaks to the rich do not provide jobs. and demand provides jobs. secondly, poor people who do not pay federal income tax paid vast majority of their income, bigger than 15% marginal rate at the
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cash register for goods that they buy. i want to get that in the last segment and was not able to. thank you, sir, for your time. guest: a lot of people do not realize that the postal service in the last few years have made mass of them kleiman reductions. when people talk about the size -- massive employment reductions. they exclude the postal service because the data excludes them. there have been huge changes going on in the postal service. you feel the emotion there. he is a front line worker with some resentment against people in the higher chain of command. it is nothing about anyone's particular job. that is how it comes down. host: asheville, north carolina. caller: thank you for taking my call. i am a retired federal employee
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from the veterans administration. i would like to make two comments, maybe three. the caller from texas talked about the explosive expansion of bureaucracy. i can absolutely attest to that. at the va, when i first began, we had 440 beds and 1,000 employees. now there are 130 beds and 1,200 employees. the other things that i think callers need to understand about federal salaries, especially in the veterans administration, is that you are trying to recruit physicians and pay peanuts, you will get monkeys. the va physicians i knew from my career, most of them worked very hard. guest: one thing the government
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has done is to make a concerted effort to raise physicians' salaries. it has risen from 111,000 -- $111,000 to $189,000. several callers had mentioned retirement. the civilian retirement fund has a $2 trillion liability. military retirement has a $3.50 trillion liability. but that in context of social security. we really have another social security that is not often talk about that has to be dealt with in the future. host: 2 federal workers show high retention rates? guest: yes, >> tomorrow, a political realm table with kevin madden and
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michael bocian. terence samuel identifies the new members to watch in the house and senate. martin klingst and robin economicdiscuss global issues and the g-20 meeting in seoul, south korea. >> in an ideal world, the fact that there were people in the mortgage market sent signals to everybody saying, well, by investors think this thing is going to crash and burn. you could not see that the way you can see it in the stock market. because of the way these estimates were, you were basically not bidding on real mortgages, but bidding on a casino version of a mortgage. >> bethany mclean wrote about
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enron. she will talk about the current crisis and the future of the american economy sunday night at 8:00 eastern on c-span's "q &a." >> next, a supreme court argument. after that, the national transportation safety board on driver safety and older americans. then, live at 7:00 a.m., your calls and comments on "washington journal." see what people are watching on the c-span video library with the most recent video, most watched video, and most share. you can click are 2010 election tab to see our continuing coverage of the midterm elections. watch what you want, when you want. the supreme court heard oral
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arguments in arizona christian school tuition organization puvs. winn. this organization gives scholarships to students to attend private and religious schools. the court will decide if this case violates the separation of church and state. this is just over one hour.
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>> this law fulfills three necessary elements. the key point is this, not a set of the respondent's money goes to find religion. if you find an a lot tonic tag to monitor each set selling pace in tax, not a fraction of the set would go into any religious school's koppers. >> this tax money does belong to the state that the private individuals are using. it is a money that even by the new amendment says either you pay it to the state or use it for this purpose, but it is the state's money and they are giving you the right to read directed. that is their argument. it would be the taxpayer's tax dollars. >> there are two problems with
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that. with respect to injury, powerpoint is as you try the taxpayer's money, it does not find any religious program unlike other cases in which this court has considered taxpayer sending for religion. >> with respect to the other arguments, our point is this, it is speculated as to whether or not the chain of events that you spelled out what actually happened. the court said that a tax credit
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is given and sometimes reduces the amount of money be government has to spend. it does not increase it. that is different from the direct outlay. that was the issue. >> here is what the system will be. the taxpayers who are religious will be able to check a box and the check that the seine to the irs -- that check is cashed by an official and the cash is given to the local priest to say prayers for the individual who contributed the money. i in your view there is no one who can challenge that. >> the nisei two things about that. first, that is not all that different. what's the difference is, of course, in one case it is a deduction. in this case you are paying at 1 under% money that would -- 100%
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that would go into the coffers. >> i do not think that any taxpayer to attack -- could challenge that. depending on the hypothetical, i am not sure if the government is specifying which religious organizations may be eligible for the check box. if the government is doing something under-inclusive and only giving tax credits to one set of religious organizations, -- >> we can go back into history. it could have been the case that as long as they were fair to every religion, the first progress could have funded prayers a two-out the nation in churches for anyone to go and pray. i would not have violated the establishment clause. if it had, nobody could challenge it. >> we are talking about the standing, not the merits. with respect to standing, if the
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government funded only religious organizations or religious prayer, i do think that other organizations would have standing, not as a taxpayer because this court has been very clear, there are exceptions. but other organizations would have texas monthly standing. >> does anyone have standing in your view to make this challenge? >> the answer is no. i think it is the court's general reluctance to give taxpayers standing in this area. >> the fine points you are discussing is not the underlying premise. it would be unenforceable unless we meet the taxpayers
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standing. >> i think it is a very narrow exception for when someone's dollars are being taken out of their pocket and spent by the government on religion. i do not think that is happening here. >> it is gone. there is nothing more to it because no one had thought of this system at the time. >> i do not think it is gone at all. >> all you have to do to get around it is to create what we have here. >> they can get around it in some circumstances. they are under included in a government program. but at the end of the day, that is the result for every other calls in the constitution. taxpayers standing is the most narrow of exceptions.
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>> we have a bill of rights in those divisions. >> be that as it may, i believe it is very clear to say that if at the end of the date you cannot have a place to put standing, that is not a place to relax the general requirements. if you grant the place of standing, what you would be granting is for the first time a tax-credit, which is it which it -- which is a complaint about someone else's standing. >> the court is without
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standing to decide these cases. the court is without authority to decide any of those cases, but somehow nobody on the court recognized that fact nor did the s.g. recognize that fact. >> i do think it is very much like a case where we had to do with that exact problem with the court to convert standing up taxpayers and again when it was presented to the court as an article freestanding. my answer to you is yes. i think this court's decision reiterated some of the fundamental principles for the limits on the case. i think the court made it quite clear that it would go no further. you have to tremendously depart
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from what the case is about -- a government outlay of funds. it takes money out of someone's pocket to find religion. >> yousuf the answer is yes. in other words, you agree with justice kagan's criticism of those cases. he says she is right, those cases were wrongly decided. >> the results may have been the same. the bottom line decision would have been the same, but the way the support but there would have been different. >> there would have been standing in this case is. >> no taxpayer standing. there may have been other standing that could have challenged those programs. >> i do not remember whether the government participated in the case when it came up. >> we did. >> if it was not a word from the
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government about lack of standing. >> the first footnote a debrief acknowledged the fact that standing had not been pushed. i acknowledge that, particularly in the way another case arises. the government will acknowledge the standing. >> powerpoint or regrets ability is not simply -- powerpoint on or regrets ability is not simply that they will not adjust their problems. if you gave the plane did everything they are asking for, the same religious schools and the same religious sectors would be funded. they would leave in place the tax deduction.
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it would still be government revenue being spent in favor of these religious schools under their program. its a level of one-third instead of one daughter%. i do not think that satisfies their problem. at madison were told, you cannot be taxed three tents, you'll be taxed one-tenth. it is the principle that matters. >> thank you. tax credits tuition does not ballet the establishment clause because it is a mutual wall that results in scholarship programs of private choice. like the tax deduction that the court upheld in another case, it
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is one of many devices including 26 other credits that are available to arizona taxpayers on a neutral basis. >> can you explain something to me. i have been puzzling over the scheme. could you tell me why arizona does not use the tuition voucher scheme? that gives the voucher or the scholarship -- this is more complicated, complex and unusual. it let me wonderful -- it left me wondering why it was chosen. with the advantages of it now? >> justice kagan, one of the things that is true in arizona that was not true in ohio is that under their constitution any direct aid to private schools is prohibited. the other thing about the tax credit program is that it does
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encourage contributions not only from parents, but from the community at large. this provides money for low- income students. >> to the records showed the extent to which there ordinations by people who do not have students? does the record showed the extent to which there are additional donations to which you just referred? >> your honor, the record shows that there are some reports and studies that have been done that showed that there have been some children that have switched from public schools to private schools as a result of the program. many of the scholarship programs, in fact, most of the scholarship programs provide scholarships based on financial
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need. >> i do not think you answered his question. the question was a, is there anything in the record that shows whether any of the money that is involved here comes not from parents, but rather, from others who contribute to the program? >> what the record shows is that there had been a large amount of contributions. $65 million. we had the arizona department of revenue report that says with the number of contributors and who contributes -- not the individuals who contributes -- it does not specifically lined out who they contribute dues are, whether they are parents or not parents. >> i suppose that some of the contributions are $1 million? that could not be just a parent,
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right? >> you are right. >> or their contributions of that size? >> again, the record does not show what the size of the contributions or, it shows the number of contributions and the total amount of contributions. >> if you give $1 million, you still only getting $500 tax credit, right? >> that is correct. the programs are programs of private choice because any aid that reaches religious schools and does so only after four levels of private decision making. arizona at sets up the initial rules for this tax credit and after that private individuals and organizations take over. anyone can form a school tuition organization. the increase in the number and
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diversity of organizations over the 13 years that the tax credit has been in existence demonstrates the fact that this is free for everyone to use prie-dieu -- free for everyone to use. >> arizona spent some billions of dollars of public schools does it not? >> yes, your honor. quite plastic 30% or 40% of that an extended to th program. or 40% ofake a 30% that and extend it to this program. how is arizona in dealing with this problem? are they saying there are no regulations? is there a system for dealing with the legitimacy under which
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a certain religious school qualifies for this program? who decides? and hal? >> under the tax credit program, the schools have to be qualified private schools in order to participate. >> under the set of regulations and rules. >> primarily what it is, private schools in arizona satisfy the compulsory education law as long as they meet the requirements that public schools have in terms of providing qualitatively the subject matter. >> the standards have nothing to do with this program? they are standards that any private school, religious or otherwise, must meet in order to satisfy the education requirements of arizona. >> that is correct. >> that is correct.

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