it did not reach the outcome that the biggest player in the opec wanted. that is essentially the notion that the saudis wanted -- to sell into this market and try to give the assurance of supply now to protect against fear of scarcity later. host: we have been talking with kevin book about the and curren advances in treatment with dr. anthony fauci, director of the national institute of alergey and infectious diseases. then peter pantuso, president and c.e.o. of the american bus association discusses tour bus safety standards in the wake of several recent crashes. after that, presidential historian, robert kallek talks about the significance of the

so-called pentagon papers on the 40th anniversary of their being leaked to the "new york times" as well as the more recent wikileaks documents releases. as always, your phone calls and questions starting at 7:00 a.m. eastern, "washington journal." >> this week on "newsmakers" senator lamar axe. thank you for being here. >> sometime later in the summer, the group that's led by vice president biden met again this week. do you feel that republicans and democrats are any closer than they were to coming to some sort of agreement on this? >> not yet, but we're going to

have to agree. there won't be a debt ceiling increase unless we have some agreement on a significant reduction in debt. and that significant reduction is going to have to include entitlements. we have some of our best members of congress and the vice president in the middle of this. hopefully they'll come to a result. >> you don't see them getting any closer yet? >> i don't know, really, because they're not reporting their day-to-day negotiations, and they really shunt he. so they're in the preliminary stages. we all know that we have a deadline of august 1 and that between now and then we need to deal with this. i want us to deal with it, because it would be irresponsible to default on our debt and it would be irresponsible for us to not take action that's significant right now to reduce our debt. >> wouldn't their deadline be earlier than august 1? in other words, when do you have to have something ready so you can take it to the senate floor? >> that's a very good point.

before that. >> if they agree, they will have substantial support. i don't think eric canter and john kyle, for example, would bring back to the republican caucuses something that they didn't believe could get support. >> can you give us some specific areas where you think republicans and democrats have agreed or do agree or can agree to cuts that you think will be part of this mix? right now it looks like the two sides are so far apart. as you said, republicans have said entitlements have to be part of this and tax increases should not be. democrats have said just the opposite. do you see some areas that aren't getting talked about that are potential consensus areas? >> well, social security is an example you don't hear very much about. and we all remember 1983, or most of us do, when president

reagan and tip o'neill got together and made decisions that made social security solvent for a long period of time. and nobody paid a political price for it. mr. reagan was re-elected in 1984. social security is an area where we should be able to agree pretty quickly. while it wouldn't save too much money, it would be a signal that we could deal with entitlements. you can look at the simpson-bowles debt commission and see where some democrats and rrps came to an agreement. and you can even look at the gang of six, now the gang of five centers, where they had some agreement. so you put any group of democrats-republicans together who are working in good faith, they ought to be able to figure out how to stop spending money that we don't have. >> democrats have been resistant to changing social security, resistant to medicare changes. the republicans have always been ruling out tax increases. is it realistic to think that democrats would come to the table on entitlement changes if republicans aren't willing to

deal? >> i think it is realistic. let's take medicare. medicare is the biggest part of the federal budget. it is the biggest part of the problem of the -- of the spending problem we have. president obama has said that, president clinton had said that, vice president biden has said that. nancy pelosi said it has to be on the table. to democrats and republicans say that. the demin chi said that, and there's no responsible way to deal with the debt unless you find a way to make medicare strong for the future. >> but -- and you supported or you voted to advance paul ryan's medicare proposal, the house budget and the senate. >> i did. >> that's getting a lot of blowback. how do you discuss that? >> it's not hard for me at all. i don't think a democrat has a very good standing to criticize

paul ryan, unless the democrat has a better plan. i mean, if you have all the democratic leaders as well as republican leaders saying medicare is the part of the problem and spending is the biggest part of the problem, and if paul ryan has a plan and then somebody needs to come up with a better one. now, i like better the proposal by former republican senator pete domenici and allis rivlin, a former democratic budget official. they have the idea of premium support for seniors. but they allow you to go into the marketplace and shop for what you might want for health care insurance. but if you don't find what you want, you can fall back on traditional medicare. i think that would make many seniors a lot more comfortable. also, it wouldn't apply to anybody who's over 55. >> you mentioned, senator, that the gang of six is now the gang of five. and while they continue to meet and continue to talk with other senators who are interested in a bipartisan sloogs here, they're pretty much on ice in

coming to an agreement that the senate is going to take up any time soon, as you know. i wonder if you still see the prospects for a deal of the scope that they were trying to work on, fortune in dollars over the decade along the framework of what senator simpson and erskine bowles came up with last year, or do you see a smaller deal, maybe half that amount, that some sort of more marginal, whatever can be agreed upon and what is a short period of time between now and august 2. >> i think it all depends on president obama. if president obama decides that he wants to embrace a plan a lot like the one recommended by the deficit commission that he appointed, or by the gang of six, and that would have to include entitlements, he can get that. and he can go down in history as a president who made a courageous decision and i believe he'll have bipartisan support for it. if, on the other hand, he and democratic leaders decide they want to try to beat up republicans on the medicare issue in the next election, he won't get that. so i hope he'll do the former.

and we badly need to deal with a debt. we're borrowing -- 40 cents of every dollar we spend. i come from a state where i was governor where we have zero highway debt. we have none. so all our gas tax money goes to build roads. here so much of it goes for interest on the debt. we've got to stop this. >> if president obama makes that decision to go for a smaller deal that may be more gettable at that point, is that something you could support and republicans could support? in other words, would that go far enough towards solving the problem? >> it would depend on what he recommended. but i'm going to do my very best to support any sensible proposal that does something significant to reduce our debt and that does something significant about these mandatory entitlement programs which are bankrupting the country. there are many variations of that. i don't want to rule these in or out before i get them. but i'm counting on the vice

president and this working group and the president. we only have one president in our country at a time. he's the agenda-setter. he's supposed to say here's the strategy, here's the solution. i'm going to persuade at least half of you that i'm right. he's got at least in the senate plenty of democrats and republicans who are open to a wide variety of proposals. >> on social security, sir, the house republicans session versus put out a proposal that would allow workers to opt out of social security, take that 6.2% and put it into what's called a safe account, privatizing social security. would you like to see a vote on that in the senate? >> i'd probably vote for it, but i don't think we're likely to privatize social security. president bush tried to do that. he made that the biggest part of his second term. he made 60 speeches and he couldn't get 60 votes in the united states senate. but there are a variety of ways to adjust social security very slightly so that it's solvent for the long term.

and what our goal should be is to make she is slight adjustments today, before we have a crisis and make it solvent and strong so people can count on it. >> are you concerned about the political fallout of a proposal being put forth by house republicans on this that could be seen as doubling down on trying to privatize entitlement programs after the medicare vote? >> that shouldn't surprise anybody. republicans have always suggested and most republicans have -- and i'm one of them -- who said we ought to try private accounts. let people take their social security money and put it in a private account. i'd like to try it. i'm a believer in pilot programs rather than apply it to the whole system. but i don't think that's likely to happen this year. what could happen, if the president recommends it, is a sound way to strengthen social security for the long, long term. and that would be important to the country, it would build confidence in the economy, jobs would begin to come back and we'd be feeling a lot better than our economic future.

>> as these meetings go on, a lot of outside groups, groups that are pushing things like the balanced budget amendment are weighing in pretty heavily with a lot of members. are they complicating the g.o.p. leadership's ability to sort of forge a deal here? are they boxing you in at all in terms of saying what should and shouldn't be on the table? >> they're exercising their constitutional rights. it says petitioning the government is what you have a chance to do, and we listen to them and then should make our own decisions. john kyle, our number-two ranking republican is our represent in these discussions. we have a lot of confidence in john kyle. what we've decided to do is to not send him a list of instructions about what to do or what not to do. we're going to hold our fire and wait for him to come back and recommend to us what we should do, and then we can make a decision. >> if, as the summer goes on, and you get towards august 2 and there's no grand deal in

the works and -- i mean, are republicans willing to sort of do this in a more piecemeal manner, have a series of debt-limit votes before the next election? >> well, i suppose anything could happen. rather than trying to answer hypothetical questions, here's what we ought to do -- we should make sure we always pay our bills, that we don't default on our debt and do something significant to reduce our long toirble debt. we ought to act like grown-ups and get it done. >> should taxes be part of the solution? if that's what it would take to get to a $4 trillion deal, to have revenues do part of the job of paying down the debt? would that be acceptable to you? >> i'm going to wait to see what john kyle comes back with. i believe that the problem we have is a spending problem. we've gone from spending about 20% of the total growth output of this country every year on the federal government to about 25%. if we could get down closer to 20% on spending over a period

of time, we'd be a lot healthier as a country. so i'd like the focus to be on spending. i'm going to wait to see what he brings back. >> would you consider eliminating popular tax deduction, mortgage interest, that sort of thing, that denies the treasury revenue? would you consider that as part of a deal? >> i think tax expenditures ought to be considered. we have about $1.2 trillion every year, which are a variety of tax breaks. now, many of them are very socially desirable tax breaks. they encourage conservation, they encourage home buying. others encourage ethanol and give tax breaks to people who invest in windmills. i think it's time that we took a look at those. the former chairman of the council of economic advisors said about $400 billion of the $1.2 trillion ought to be gradually eliminated. if we did that, that would help balance the budget. >> so you would consider that,

even though people have said those are tax hikes. if you eliminate those, that's a tax hike. >> well, it's not a tax hike overall if the total amount of money is revenue-neutral. so the question then would be whether you would spend that money to reduce the debt. and let's wait and see what the group recommends. >> how long do you think the group has? you said earlier you think you need some time in advance of august 2 to get it through the senate, but also, the credit markets are watching what you all are doing. and there's some concern about getting right up until the end, like has happened with the 2011 budget talks. how long do you have, really? >> the sooner the better. we can work backwards. i think there's an informal agreement that we need to have our action done by about august 1. that would mean that in order to have something to consider, we need to get it sometime in july and that's about a month away. >> and you haven't seen the progress yet toward actually

getting to something. >> there's a lot of progress, but they're not giving us a running commentary of what they're doing. i mean, otherwise they couldn't be having the kind of confidential discussions they'd need to have to make progress. i think they're having good discussions. they're good people. they trust each other. i'm looking forward to a result in less than two weeks. >> senator, the white house has floated an idea this week of a new payroll tax cut, to give the economy another jolt given the unemployment numbers. i was curious, first, would you support that, and secondly, are you concerned at all that in these debt talks you might end up with a deal that becomes a drag on the economic recovery? >> well, many economists feel that almost any action that we take to reduce the debt will, in the short term, run a risk of hurting the economy, and in the long term almost certainly will help the economy. so that's, unfortunately, the medicine. that's what we're dealing with.

as far as apparel tax deduction, like the one we voted for last year, i think any proposal like that ought to be a part of the haven't debt group. and let's see how that fits into our overall effort to reduce the debt. what we're talking about here and the numbers that we keep hearing are that we're talking about over the long term saving trillions of dollars. that's what we're trying to do. so any taxes, any debt, any proposals, ought to all be part of that package. >> senator, if i can switch gears and ask you about the presidential campaign that's getting underway here. you had a campaign like that at one time. i'm wondering sort of how you think republicans are feeling about the prospect of taking on president obama right now, who you see in the field, who you think has the best ability to do that and win in 2012 and sort of what the process is that people like yourself go through when you think about you're on the sidelines, should i jump into the fray? what are you thinking right now?

>> they're all very rational people or they wouldn't be thinking about it. if you're thinking long and hard about whether to run for president, you probably won't. and my rule of thumb is the number one requirement for a well-qualified person is -- 90% of it is actually announcing and actually finishing the race. because, if you'll think about it, in the end here we have this great, big, complex country of ours, more than 23 million people, and on the republican side we'll probably end up with two or three people who people take seriously as competent to be the next president and likely to do that. and that's already about the case. i had dinner with one of the candidates last night. he and his wife had been up to new hampshire where they have the midnight voting. he saw my red and black shirt at the museum up there, so i know something about it. it was governor huntsman and his wife. i think he and governor pawlenty, i think governor romney, all are three former

governors with strong prospects in our party, and there may be more who have a chance to do that. >> did you give any advice to governor huntsman last night or his family? >> no, if i were so smart, i would have been in the white house. [laughter] >> what about the prospect of taking on president obama? i mean, his approval ratings have been up and down lately, but he's a sitting president and the record of defeating a sitting president is not as encouraging as one might hope. >> no, it's not. no one should underestimate president obama. i went with him to booker t. washington high school in memphis about a month ago, and he made a beautiful talk to the students there, who come from families who are among the poorest families in the country, really, and was a great example to them. he spoke directly to them. he will not be easy to defeat. but i worked for a very good president one time, the first president bush, who lost after one term, and he lost because the democrats said the economy

is stupid. and i think the vulnerability that president obama has is that republicans may be able to say, by the time we get to a year from now, he made it worse. 9% unemployment, food prices, gas prices, health care mandates, health care costs, slow-walking trade agreements, undermining right to work laws, all of that is throwing a big, wet blanket over private-sector job creation in our country. if republicans can say we're not going to blame you for problems you inherited, but we are going to give you credit for having made it worse, then he'll be vulnerable to a strong republican nominee. >> on labor issues, the national labor relations board filed a case against boeing for putting a second plant in south carolina, a non-union state, rather than creating a second plant in washington state. >> yes. >> what's your reaction on that? there will be an investigation

into this, a house hearing. what would you like to see happen? >> along with two senators i've introduced legislation to put a stop to that. this case that it's a prima facie case if a company like boeing, our largest exporter, that's in a forced unionism state expands in a right-to-work state. that completely changes the law in our state. it make it harder to create new jobs. it discourges companies from expanding and makes it more likely they can go overseas. boeing sells airplanes all over the world. today it has most of its employees, 160,000, in the united states. it can also make airplanes all over the world. and we want people to make here what they sell here. tennessee has benefited greatly from having a right-to-work law. auto plants came there because it was a competitive environment in which they could succeed. >> but the board has said because of past comments made by boeing and the fact that there was a strike in 2008 by

washington workers, that this is retaliation. it's discriminatory, that they want to open up a second plant in south carolina because they're also then saying, you're not going to strike in the future. >> well, companies have always made decisions about where to locate based upon the labor environment there, among other factors. i'm sure when nissan came to tennessee it looked at the central location, and second, we had a right-to-work law and kentucky did not. we were both in the center of the market. we didn't have an income tax. we had a good road program. you look at all those things. usually to prove a case of labor discrimination like this you have to show that the union was hurt. in this case boeing actually added 2,000 jobs in washington state. in practical terms, boeing announced this two years ago. they spent $1 billion building the first new production plant in nearly 40 years in the united states. they've hired 1,000 people to

work there. they're going to open the plant next month. and here comes this acting general counsel of the labor board in to stop that. i mean, boeing has to be competitive because it has competitors in europe who also make and sell airplanes. >> i want to go back to politics, because "politico" is reporting that gingrich's top staff has resigned en masse on thursday. what do you make of this? do you think he can continue? >> well, i don't know. newt is one of our most durable idea men in the republican party. he's filled with visions and ideas. but presidential campaigns are difficult undertakings. there's often a lot of turmoil in the campaign. we'll have to see. >> we have about five minutes left. go ahead. >> i want to ask you about the politics of the boeing issue that we were just talking about. do you think that's going to play a role in this campaign? do you think regulatory issues and issues like the boeing case will be an instance that

republicans increasingly are going to point to, to talk about why democrats have the wrong economic prescription? >> the answer is yes. i mean, if i heard one little phrase as i go around tennessee or around the country and my fellow republicans hear the same thing, it's too many regulations. the obama administration is throwing a big wet blanket over private-sector job creation. all those things i mentioned a moment ago, from undermining the right to work to the health care mandates, to the environmental regulations, to the proposals for expensive energy taxes. i mean, we're getting smothered by government regulations at a time when we need to be liberated from those and make it easier and cheaper to create private-sector jobs. so the answer is yes. too many regulations, even in the area of higher education, we're vastly overregulated. i even had to vote against the last higher education law because the stack of regulations was as tall as i am

and the new law would double the size of the regulations. that just costs money, limits innovation and takes money away that ought to be used on teaching students. >> senator, you mentioned nissan. i was curious, the administration has taken credit for the resurgence of the domestic auto industry. is that a problem? is that going to be a problem in 2012 for republicans who voted against it in states like tennessee? >> i think the president was exactly wrong to go to the midwest and say that the auto bailout saved the auto industry. what saved the auto industry was the right-to-work law. it kept 22 states in this country that had an environment in which manufacturers could make here what they sell here. and so nissan and now volkswagen coming to tennessee and general motors in tennessee and thousands of suppliers have been able to make cars and trucks in the southeastern united states and really force competition in the midwest that kept the united states as a place where you can make cars

and trucks. if we hadn't had right-to-work laws and states that adopted them, those plants would have probably been in mexico or still in japan, and those jobs would have been overseas. >> senator, the senate hasn't accomplished much this year. >> well, that's an understatement. >> nobel laureate can't get confirmed by the senate. the gang of six has not been able to cut through the partisanship and some of the procedural hurdles that exist in the senate, which is what they were formed to do. i wonder if you can talk a little bit about whether you think the senate is broken. is there dysfunction that's there that is impossible to break through? you were involved in this process of trying to revamp the rules earlier this year. i bond der if you think it's made any difference. >> it has made a difference. the problem is that the democrats haven't brought anything up to talk about. the way the senate works is that when you're the leader,

you have the majority, you set the agenda. so it's up to harry reid, the democratic leader, to set an agenda every week. he can bring up any single thing he wants to bring up. he'll bring up some small business bill and we'll stay on it for three weeks. i'm not sure why they're doing that at a time when we have 9% unemployment, we have a health care law that's causing people to lose their health care. we've got a financial regulation bill that needs to be reformed. we've got three trade bills that we ought to be passing in order to open up this country for new jobs. we have plenty we can do, but it's up to the democratic leader to set the agendas, and in the senate they're bringing nothing up. >> there are some nominees, too, that republicans have not allowed to move forward for various reasons. i mean, some of the agendas items that democrats have had have sort of died on the vine. >> occasionally with our constitutional responsibility

we have slowed somebody down. for example, we said, don't send us a nominee to be secretary of commerce until you send us the three trade agreements that we need to be dealing with. for example, in columbia, we've -- colombia, we have a situation where they can sell here but we can't sell there. that's our own doing. we need to pass a law that permits us to do in their country what they already are allowed to do in our country. we want to use our leverage to do that. but i'll place the blame for a slow-walking senate directly writ belongs, and that's on the majority leader, because he has the sole responsibility to set the agenda in the senate. >> can i just wrap up by tapping into your experience as education secretary? there's been a lot of discussion lately that we've seen about college, the expense of college and how much it costs. and some have said that it's the next economic bubble and questioning whether or not college is really worth it. do you get an investment on your return? for those parents who have kids graduating and now they're

living with them, what are your thoughts? >> it's always hard to pay for college. but here are the facts -- you can go to a good public university for tuition of about $8,000 a year. that's a bargain. you can go to a community college for about $2,000 or $3,000 a year tuition. that's a bargain. half of america's college students have a federal grant or loan to help pay for college. so there are plenty of opportunities out there. we can help if we would stop sending health care costs to states. this won't sound like it has anything to could with education, but as a former governor, i know it does. we send states new medicaid costs, and they have to use state dollars for that instead of for the community college or, say, the university of california or tennessee. that drives up tuition. so it's the federal government's fault, really, that state college tuitions are going up. but i think they're still a pretty good bargain. >> senator, thank you for being on "newsmakers." >> thank you for inviting me. >> we're back with our reporters, julie, let me begin

with you about where these debt talks, deficit talks, stand. you've got vice president joe biden leading a bipartisan, bicameral group. where are they? >> group met on capitol hill this week and they're talking. everyone says the meetings are productive. they're actually making some progress. we haven't actually seen it yet. you heard senator alexander allude to that. even their closest colleagues are not getting the real report on what is being agreed upon and waste being left for later. the reality is there's very little common ground on the big issues that they still have to solve, entitlements, whether tax revenues are going to be part of this deal. and there's not even, really, a sense yet of how large the deal is going to be. but i think we did hear senator alexander acknowledge that there is at least a good possibility that it's going to be about a $2 trillion debt savings deal, not the $4 trillion or more that was trillion or more that was initially envisioned by