since about 1998, we are at a slow rate of increase, and there's quite a bit of research on that topic. my group is also working on that question. we feel that what we're seeing in the global temperature record is a sum of two different which is an inexorable upward trend probably associated with increasing carbon dioxide. the other which is a variation from warm to cold and back again taking place over decades. those two added to gather means that for some decades, when the variation is going up and the trend is going up, you see an accelerated increase in temperature and wind the variation is going down and the trend -- but they cancel each other and you get steady temperatures. we in -- are in a period of that right now. i think we will see it accelerating again in a decade or two so we are quite concerned

temperature increases are being masked by events and aerosols and things like that. host: thank you for our series on tracking the weather. we will continue tomorrow. then tomorrow we will wrap up with the role of the national weather service. that is it for "washington journal." live coverage of the chamber of commerce and their annual labor day briefing with the head of the chamber of commerce, tom donohue.

>> in this week before labor day we are live at the chamber of commerce in washington where president and ceo thomas donohue will preview the chamber that the ideas on job creation that will be presented to congress and the president next week. the chief economist martin regalia and senior vice president randy johnson will discuss the impact of washington's an agenda on of -- on employers. one of several events we are covering on the c-span networks regarding jobs and job creation. afl-cio holding their annual labor a press event. we will have cameras there as their president talks about jobs in the economy and what needs to be done to address unemployment. also today, republican presidential candidate and former utah governor and ambassador to china jon huntsman is campaigning in new hampshire. he will unveil his jobs plan today at a campaign appearance at the gilchrist metal fabricating plant in new

hampshire. our cameras are covering that and that will be later on as scheduled. just added, want to let you know about this. the president, who next week will make a speech on jobs sometime after labor day, is today going to be calling on congress to pass the transportation authorization bill. that appearance at the white house, those comments by the president, coming up in about a half an hour at 10:35 a.m. eastern and we will carry it live on c-span2 and if you miss it you can see it online at c- span.org.

>> good morning, everybody. welcome to the chamber's enable labor day briefing and we are looking for it to hearing from martin regalia, our chief economist, and randy johnson. before that, tom donohue, the president and ceo, has remarks to make and then he will take a few questions before he has to run to another appointment. >> thank you, tom, and thank you, marty. we look forward to your latest economic forecast and your assessment of the state of the economy. as you know, marty is one of the best in the business. pleat -- speaks plain english. for an economist, it is a rare skill. it may not agree with him all the time but at least you understand what he is talking about. we will hear from randy johnson.

as tom said, randy gets to deal with the easy issues like health care and labor relations and all of the topics where parties seem to agree all the time. i will be very interested to hear what he has to say about the three new regulations issued to the nlrb as the chairman made her way out the door. and they will be very interesting. their presentations, i hope, will help create some useful context to the major economic debates that are now re-gaining momentum as people come back from their holiday. in the coming days, everybody and their uncle will be offering a jobs plan, and that is a good thing, because that is where the focus needs to be -- on jobs. we are not going to be able to deal with the other challenges we face if we don't start putting people back to work, to take them off the public payroll and have them paying taxes and

driving economic confidence. at the chamber, we have been intensely focused on jobs since the outbreak of the financial crisis. just look at the front of the building. we have been talking about it for a long time. so, we want to share some ideas from the institutions that actually create jobs and opportunity, the american business community. the most immediate priority facing our nation is to create jobs for some 25 million americans who are either unemployed, underemployed, had given up looking, or are new entrants -- graduating from college, leaving high school, where a lot of hope for the future and trying to get into the workforce. to do so, we need policies that promote and sustain strong critique and the growth. we need to address the extraordinary fiscal and competitive challenges that are smothering growth and driving

away jobs. but at the same time, we must also address the immediate need for jobs now today, for those 25 million americans. we need action now, not next month or >> dear or after next election. we need it now. so, the u.s. chamber is currently finalizing a letter to the president, to the congress, to the public with specific, practical steps that we can take to help quickly create millions of new jobs without increasing the deficit. because a lot of the systems and plans you are going to hear are going to cost more money than we will put back into the system. let me give you a very short preview of some of our ideas which, for the purpose of today, falling to six baskets. the first basket and perhaps the easiest is trade.

we need to push the pedal to the metal ended the three pending free-trade agreement with colombia, south korea, and panama, completed. i have been saying for a long time that by doing that, we would save 380,000 american jobs. which would otherwise go to our competitors. as you know, canada has an agreement with colombia now and the eu has a big agreement with korea. i hope we would say that many jobs because i know those people are picking up business we are losing. the south korean deal alone, i am told, would create 280,000 jobs for americans in the near -- very near future. another idea on trade you don't hear much about. under the executive authority, the administration could enact nearly all of its proposed export control reforms without legislation. by the way, they have been working on them for three years.

there is a lot of agreement on doing it, so, if we go out and sell these things that you could otherwise by on a street corner and europe, one study says we could create as many as 340,000 jobs by increasing the number of products we can export without compromising national security. that a lot of jobs. the second area is energy. we can create literally millions of new american jobs if we simply develop our own abundance and its resources on federal lands, offshore, and on private land. of those resources are primarily oil and gas. we can do so in an environmentally responsible way, generating economic growth, job creation, and government revenues, while reducing our alliance on foreign sources. we can also create jobs by building more energy infrastructure. for example, we have all heard the argument about the keystone pipeline connecting alberta,

canada, to u.s. refineries in texas. i have been very encouraged to hear that the administration is moving in a positive way there. but we need to do this because we can create 250,000 american jobs in a big hurry, and investments in the united states of more than $20 billion and government revenues of about half a billion dollars a year. this is a sure thing. we will, in our letter, outlined four or five more of these. and if you add them up you are talking about millions of jobs without spending money -- only giving the go-ahead to do what needs to be done. the third bucket is infrastructure. i am very pleased to be talking about infrastructure right now. david, the chief operating officer, is over at the white house with the president that a discussion on infrastructure. and tomorrow i will go to

dallas to join the president's council on jobs and competitiveness to talk about this. what do we need. it is simple. we need a highway bill. and we can't cut the size of it. it pays for primarily from user fees. we need an faa bill and we need a water bill because this is a complicated issue. if you don't have them, then you lose the jobs you have today. if you do get them and we keep pushing forward on it, we can create jobs that we need tomorrow. an estimated $250 billion is sitting around in a global private investment firms that would like to invest in our infrastructure because they have a sure way of being paid. we have seen it happen in individual states and we are very anxious that we move forward on this and a big-time way. because the people who get these jobs are the people, many of them would otherwise be working in a housing industry that

doesn't exist. we can create probably 1.5 million to 2 million jobs over the next period of time. and i hope to talk more about this tomorrow in dallas. the fourth issue, or the fourth basket, is travel and tourism. no, we have about 7.4 million people in the united states who are employed in the travel and tourism business. if we could simply go back to the 2000 level of bringing people into the united states, we could create another 1.3 million american jobs. look, there are issues, there are national security and border security issues, but people are not very welcome when they come here. folks go from canada, do you, who would normally go to the united states, are going to other places because we did not treat them very well.

we could do more things about spending money to get more people to come here and bring their cash. the fifth issue is regulatory relief. if there was ever a time and our nation's history where we should say, hold on a minute, we are putting out regulations as best as you can count them. look at that thing back -- things that came out of the nlrb yesterday, look at the things people are talking about coming out of the epa. we think it is time for the nation -- that we should take a breath. we need to be very careful when we look at what regulations we will put in place. the administration should immediately issued an executive order directing agencies not to issue any discretionary regulations that would have a substantial economic impact until the economy improves. by the way, you hear all of the discussions in today's news about the billion dollar and above regulatory issues. there are tons of them. maybe they are important.

but if they are not life- threatening issues, we are told of them off for a while. now is not the time for a slew of new regulations that kill jobs. now is the time to create jobs. finally, let me say a word on taxes. we need a tax reform and an entitlement reform program. you know, we have written to congress. we think when the 12 apostles get themselves together and start doing this, we really need to look at those issues. we can't do that in the short term. we can do it quickly but we can't do it right now. but there are some tax things we can do right now. i would just mention one. we need to think if we could have a tax holiday and let companies bring some of the money they have already earned -- because, you know, we are the only country that pays double taxes. the corporations do when they earn it overseas, they pay in

there and pay it here, so they leave the money over there. if we had a tax holiday and lower the number significantly -- they will not bring it all home because a lot of their future business is overseas, where 95% of the world customers are -- but they will bring a lot of the home and put it into the system. by reducing the rate for a specific period for these profits earned overseas, u.s. multinationals could bring as much as $1 trillion back here. i don't know if they would but a good number. a new study suggests this move could create 2.9 million jobs over a two-year implementation period. i don't know if it is that many. but 30 percent of it is worth doing. and there is nothing lost. there is no cost. you are going to pay less taxes on it. but you are not getting any taxes on it right now. so, let me conclude. these are a few of our ideas. our letter to the president and

congress will contain more details on all of them. our job plan will be accompanied by a massive mobilization of our underlying membership of 3 million companies and our grass- roots army. we are encouraging them to tell our elected officials how our plan will create jobs in their communities and to share their own ideas of other things that ought to be thought about that will get jobs there in a hurry. this will be our underlying focus for as long as it takes to get our economy moving again and put people back to work. of salt usan doesn't from the responsibilities to tackle the other -- doesn't absolve us from the response below these to tackle other issues like the tax code and entitlements, and a whole basket of issues. the point is we need to act on all of this now. we need to get moving, and we

need leadership in the business community, it in the congress, and the administration. some would say, we have heard all of these ideas before. the answer is, yes, you have. not been as many details, not in a simple, "here's how you do it" list. the reason why you are hearing them again is they have not done a damn thing about it. we will keep pressing the point is until our government leaders start moving on them. there will be questions of how quickly these ideas could work. we believe they could start working in very short order. look, there is no magic wands. if you are looking for a miracle, go to church. we are not getting away miracles. if you are looking for practical ideas that could start the process of recovering the millions of jobs we lost since 2007, then start these things right now. now, one thing is for certain. if we do nothing, if we sit on our hands, if we wait for things

to improve, if we go ahead and try to spend more money to try to make this work, we won't create the jobs we desperately need. we will continue to fall further behind. so, the chamber is committed to bringing -- being the leader in trying to push this particular plan. we look forward to other people's plans, but this one doesn't cost. this one is stuff we can do with the authority of the congress and the authority of the administration. we are committed to working with all parties to ensure america remains not only the greatest economic power on earth, but the greatest country on earth, and we better get about it because right now we are losing some of our attraction. i thank you very much. i think when you talk to marty and you talk to randy, you will see why we are making these proposals. we are focusing very clearly on what is going on in the economy and what we can do to help, and we are focusing very, very

clearly, with a sharper focus than we have had an eye long time, on what is going on on the labor side and health care and other matters, all of which add to the cost side. what we are talking about, starting this morning, is how we add to the job site. thank you very much. i have to go and do another thing but if you have a couple of questions i will take in. one rule, you have to tell me who you are and who you represent. we will start with you because you got up real fast. >> thank you very much. my name is dan hancock, i write for "inside u.s. trade. could you have been clear calling for a free-trade agreement to come forth and be submitted to congress. given the current atmosphere in congress, what makes you think they can work together on that issue specifically questioned do you have specific -- >> i think it is very clear there is a commitment to work

together on the trade it in great -- agreements. they are looking at the numbers fading away. they held them off, both parties, while they were trying to avoid the debt default. everybody agreed as soon as we come back in september we will send them up. it is not only the trade agreement but the trade adjustment assistance and they have to figure out the sequence of voting. i think everybody is ready to do it. if they don't do it, not only would we lose and not the -- a lot of jobs, not only losing the position of responsibility and the americas, but we will lose some position in the world and it would be a very sad day if we walk away from these deals and others would step in our place. they already are. do you's business with korea went up 13% and the first 17 business with's

korea. >> you said all the details have -- have not been worked out. is there a reason you are confident? >> yes. it is only a sequence -- who goes first, second. look, the urgency of this deal was significant when they all agreed to wait until they came back in september. today it is very significant. we are losing jobs every day. we've got to get off our butt and do this deal. a couple of more -- a couple more. blue shirt. i will keep coming this way. >> who is -- eric martin, bloomberg news. at this point, who is presenting the greatest resistance to a tax holiday, are, but is divided -- our company is divided? >> i don't see a lot of resistance.

we are saying, look, if he did this, you will put a lot of money in play. if you put a lot of money in play -- and it does not have to come from the government -- some of it -- they claim, last time they gave out dividends and they didn't start new jobs. what do you think people did with the dividends? they went to the store, they bought a car, they pushed the economy. so, i don't want to get in that argument. we are just saying this is one of the things you could do. you could do it by the stroke of a couple of pans. and i think people might find it useful. right here. right behind you. >> jason from reuters. you said about $250 billion is waiting to be invested into it and the structure by private firms and that public spending is not the answer. >> i didn't say that. the public spending that we get, money from the user fees, should

not be cut. all three of the bills are languishing and we are getting short term issues -- they don't get the six-year bill. those in the state and local communities, they will not put their money out when they did not know if the government will be in for three months or whatever. that part of the federal money has to go. we support and infrastructure bank. i don't care how you do it. but there is lots of private money there. people found investing in infrastructure is a good idea but they are not going to do it unless there are some programs. >> that was the second part of the questions, regarding the infrastructure bank. the ec much chance of support for that from republicans in congress? >> i think it could be done if we did the other stuff. if there was movement. and if everybody saw this would create a lot of jobs. this does not require a good deal of federal money, if any.

do a lot of these because these guys have got to do their things. which one do you want me to take? all right, good. >> ken hoover. in order to get a highway bill that is of sufficient size, do you think the gasoline tax needs to be increased or is there another way to get the revenue? >> there are three numbers. there is the current highway bill, which some people in congress want to cut back 30%. that is categorically stupid idea. there are some people who think we can do sufficiently with the amount of money we are now spending. that certainly would keep a lot of people employed and might give us a chance, if it were a long term bill, to attract some private equity. my own view is, before this is over -- in no, i don't know wind

-- it has been 18 years since -- i don't know when -- it has been 18 years since we increase the federal fuel tax, and we are getting more miles per gallon and then so we are doing less with the money we have, so you can make your own conclusions. so, i thank you very much. you will really enjoy this. if anybody was to track down later. it is all yours. thank you. >> thank you all very much. i think i am going to go first and lay some ground work on the economy and then randy is going to finish up with some of the issues specifically in the labor markets. when you look at the economy today, we see an economy that has, based on the most recent data, gone through a much deeper

downturn and come out of it in a much more tepid fashion than we originally thought. some interesting -- you can draw some interesting conclusions from that. one is that perhaps the stimulus bill, the much maligned stimulus bill, might -- actually might have had a little more impact than people thought because what you see is an economy the first year so grew at 3.3, 3.4%, and then as the stimulus package wanes and expired, use of the economy drifts down a little bit. part of the most recent downturn in the first part of this year was it did to natural disasters, floods in the midwest, earthquakes in japan, nuclear meltdown, and a spike in oil prices, all of which have run their course and now are

starting to pass behind us. so, it gives us a little hope going down the road that we can re accelerate -- re-accelerate the second half of this year back to 2% or 2.5% growth. the problem in the long run, jobs, the labor day discussion, is the growth simply is not fast enough. when you look at an economy -- and this shows the economy relative to the long run potential -- you see it drops below the potential during economic downturns and then it comes back. and generally it comes back fairly quickly. even back in 1974 or 1975 or 1982 when we had long lived economic downturns that were relatively steep by historical standards, we still got back fairly quickly. we did because we grew very quickly and recessions and recoveries since 1991, even

though in many cases they were mild recessions -- the 1991 and the 2001 recessions were quite mild -- we did not get back very quickly, we did not grow very quickly. and this goes back at least 60 years. kennedy asked arthur oak, his then chief economist or chairman of council of economic advisers, to exploit -- explore this, and he looked at the relationship which later came to be called his law, relationship between growth and unemployment. how quickly have to grow to get unemployment back. back in those days, 3% to get 1% drop in the unemployment rate. now it is about two-one ratio. what it means is if you want to get back to your potential rate of growth, if you want to get back to your long run unemployment rate, you got to grow above your potential rate

of gdp. we would have to grow at about 4.5% to 5% for two to three years to get unemployment the wind down from 9% to but 6% level or above 5.5% level that most economists believe is a full employment level. nothing is new here. i hear again and again about the disassociation between growth and jobs. there is no disassociation between growth and jobs. ok? the problem is, we don't have enough growth and if you don't grow at or above the long tube -- long-term potential rate of growth you don't create jobs. we put a chart together an updated with the most recent data, it shows coming out of the downturns prior to 1982, we grew very rapidly in the first year and even the first two years, well above our long-run rate of potential rate of growth. and we put people back to work

fairly quickly. but in the most recent recessions and recoveries, we grow much more weekly -- weakly. first year, a little over 3%. the first two years, down to about 2.5% rate of growth, which is just about our long run rate of potential gdp growth. what does that mean? the way we define these measures, our long run potential, or the not accelerating inflationary rate of unemployment, how fast the economy can grow and employ all the new entrants into the workforce. that is kind of your potential. that is estimated now to be somewhere around 2.5%. so, if we grow 2.5% you create enough jobs to employ all the new entrants. maybe 1 million or 1.2 million a year.

something in that nature did you grow faster than that you start to make up the slack that he created during the downturn did you grow slower, you create more slack. we are going to ask later on, what is your forecast for friday on the jobs number, and it is like 75,000. why that? 75,000 times 12 generates 900- something thousand, and that is about the new entrants, and if you are growing at just about your long run potential which estimate to be around 2.25% to 2.5%, then the numbers all fit. i realize it is not real scientific but it is at the front -- the way most people really do for testing. you could build a 300 as equation model to tell you what i just did in a couple of sentences but you will not get much more in a way of at received from that than my kind of back of the envelope, straight line roller approach. we are not growing fast enough. we have to get the economy growing faster if you want to

create the jobs. when you look at the component told in that bag -- 77% of the economy is consumption. we are not seeing a lot of it. consumption is not something that is hard to explain. it is one of the few things in economics where we actually put together a mathematical -- mathematical relationships that do pretty darn well not only explain the past but what it ought to be in the future. the two biggest components are always income and wealth. if you look at this graph, incomes have come back a little bit -- generating a little, by hook and by crook. not creating a whole lot of jobs. there is some real wage growth. and we are also doing it with tax cuts and reduced taxes and things like payroll taxes and the like, all of this which contribute to disposable income and in turn drives consumption. every additional dollar of disposable income drives about 65 cents spending. the other big component as well -- and that -- is well.

that is where the shortfall is. in theade about 8 back stock market mostly. the other big asset on most people's balance sheets, their homes, have not contributed. so, when we look at housing and i look at housing, it is really two questions. one is, how many worked in housing and how much income could degenerate building and selling more homes. but the other factor is, when you get the housing market settled out and you underpin those housing prices and actually start to see price appreciation again, you start to get the welfare no. and that is the more profound impact on housing of the economy today. it is not what you can do with building more homes and building new appliances, which is important. this is fundamentally important. that affects 12% of the economy or so. this affects 70% of the economy. and we lost a ton of net worth, and where we have to make it

back is and assets. there is no other assets that is going to step up and take over for the house, the home, in the average american's portfolio. 60% of americans, 67 prison sign on their own homes and in most cases they see the -- 60 percent -- 68% of americans, 67% of holmes's and most cases they have seen the value drop. it is a hard market to fix when you have imbedded losses in the home. a you have millions of people who have homes where the mortgage is valued hired and the underlying home, negative equity situations. negative equity situations are almost impossible to address without somebody taking a loss -- either the government has to make a loss to make good on these things, in which case we add to the deficit significantly, or the individuals will hold those loans, namely the banking system, will take a loss.

nobody is anxious to take a loss so everybody kind of dragging their feet. on the one hand, nobody wants to -- wants to throw people out of their homes and go through the expense of foreclosure and then have to turn around and hold the property on your books at a depressed value. it has a negative impact on capital. if you could keep the people in their homes and talked about up a little bit the ultimate loss is a little bit less. everybody kind of drag their feet. when you drag your feet of these things you don't get equilibrium in the market, and when you don't get the market selling out you don't get them coming back. you can look at the various markets around the country and see where it has worked out. in the places where there was not a lot of overbuilding and overcapacity, we have seen house prices firm -- upper midwest and places like that. but in areas where there is a lot of over-building and a lot of current that vacant homes for sale, that is whether prices are most depressed. places like las vegas, and to a

lesser extent southern california, the phoenix area, around atlanta and down on to seven florida. those places that were highly speculative. it is going to take some time. the economy will not get back to above potential performance, consistently above potential performance, until we see the housing market bottomed out and start to come back. i think that is the key. unfortunately there is not a whole lot of policy that can be devoted to that that does not get prohibitively expensive and at the same time takes a lot of winners or losers. because the people who stayed in and continued to make their payments on their homes even though in some cases they have negative equity, two of such people are my son and daughter- in-law who live in detroit -- they continue to make those payments. they view them as rental payments as well because there is not any capital appreciation. but it is unfair to people like that to sit there and turn

around and say, the guy across the street stop paying a year- and-a-half ago so we will step in and make good on his negative equity. it is a very difficult problem to dress and a very expensive one and in the and something the market will have to sort through and it will sort through overtime. we have seen that short sales are up and more of those are taking place. we have seen that the foreclosure numbers are continuing to gradually eat away at this sector of the market that is still not performing. and it is making headway. we are not building any more new homes so we are working that supply back in. it is just taking a long time. one of the reasons why the economy has underperformed. investment -- we saw a couple of investment incentives. investment incentives work break -- great. they're robbing peter to pay paul, they shift the investment over time but they did not generate net new investment. if you have a long-term policy,

long-term tax policy that decreases the cost of capital and increases the rate of return on investment than you will see some fundamental change in long- term investment. but just providing a temporary tax credit, it moves it from next month into this month or next quarter into this quarter -- which is what happened. a big spurt in investment, which is highly and more -- at normal. big consumption drives and the door down and businesses produce and hires more people advise new equipment. this time we had virtually no demand but we were able to trick anybody into investing up-front. however, those policies have a tendency to run their course and without any demand behind them to keep businesses investing, the investment spurts, and in biblical sense, like the cd who falls on the ground and sports of quickly and dies. a big surge of investment for a couple of quarters and now very much a lower rate.

we still expect to see a% to 10% on growth in that area. -- 8% to 20%. but it will not pull out the economy. generally speaking it kicks in in the middle of the cycle, to give you a little bit to get towards the end. it is not something you can depend upon to drive the cycle. you look at the trade side, and with the dollar very weak -- talking about tourism, a great time to come to the united states but not a great time if you want to visit europe. the situation is the terms of trade have shifted in our favor, continue to shift in our favor, and helping to make our goods more competitive over time. so, it is a shame when you look at the trade agreements and the like sitting on the table, that we are not doing it. with our weak dollar, now it is the time you can make an impact. we got the terms of trade, the pricing mechanism working in your favor and you have this artificial obstacle in selling

and penetrating the market. this is when you want to make hay, when you want to get in there because you got a leg up. we are really kind of squandering a great opportunity not to take advantage of these weaker dollars in our ability to trade around the world. the other thing is growth of around the world -- you know, in order to drive an economy with trade, especially a large economy like ours, you need the terms of trade in your favor, a competitive advantage, and you also need growth abroad. the problem is the areas we have seen growth, like china and india, are not places where we have large penetrations of exports. we export more to western europe, to canada, to mexico. those areas, while not doing terribly bad, are not the primary areas of growth of around the world. if we could penetrate the chinese market to a greater extent and india, these would provide a growing markets for us

to sell into rather than some of the other markets which are not stagnating, but are much steadier and the rates of growth have been much steadier. now we are seeing issues in europe with the european debt situation route -- slowing the growth in europe and providing less of the potential to sell into. trade is helping but it is not going to be the great driver. it is much more of a neutral as you look at the components of the forecast. summarizing the forecast quickly. consumption, 70% of the economy. we expected to get back around 2%, 1.4% gdp growth. picking up 10% growth in investment of 10% of the economy, so you picked up about one gdp point. trade is a wash. looking at 2% to 2.5% as to what you can achieve with your grove, kind of the base forecast, and

then you kind of work off some of the more marginal issues to drive it up a little bit or down at little bit. that is why i don't see " getting back much above 2% or 2.25%. where do you get it -- get it from? when house of -- housing comeback more, consumption will be back more -- up to 3% or 3.5%. business and the tories are low, you will see businesses invest more which will give you more out of the investment side. the forecast is and it's in pieces. right now, what we are seeing is very tepid growth across the front. what does it mean for the labor market? we lost 8.5 million jobs. we put back 1.5 million or a little more. we've still had 6.75 million in terms of jobs. you've got the situation where the marginally attached workers,

in that neighborhood of 2.5 million -- it would normally be 1.2 million, so you have 1.2 million you have to replace. part-time for economic reasons, meaning they want a full-time job but there are not full-time jobs out there, that number is 8.5. it is down from 9.5. it is a good thing. but 8.5 is 4 million higher than the norm. so you add this together and you need about 13 million jobs to replace what you lost and get back to where you work. then you add a million every year. the next 10 years you get another 10 million jobs, and that is where you get to the numbers tom talked about all the the next 10 years -- 23, 24, 25 million jobs. we have never grown fast enough to create 2.5 million jobs a year. it is probably the case of this time around we will not be able to grow for 10 or 12 years straight and generate those kinds of jobs this time around, either. it is important to make hay while we can and that is what this economy is not going.

it is just not growing fast enough to generate these jobs. if you focus on creating jobs and not focus on creating growth, you are not going to be successful. it just doesn't work that way. you can create growth without jobs because you have productivity improvements. but you can't create jobs without growth because of the growth has got to be fast enough to outstrip the productivity improvements of the businesses can't meet demand just with productivity increases and therefore they have to hire. that is what drives the hiring process. everyone says, when will businesses hire? when they don't meet demand. when they are losing customers to the cost -- competition because they are not producing enough. right now they are more than meeting the demand with their existing work force. that is why the productivity numbers are going up even while gdp numbers are going down. that is what we need. it is going to take some time

because, as i said, and to stop -- 2% to 2.5% growth you generate a million jobs a year would just provides enough for the new entrants and you have something in the neighborhood of 13 million you have to work off. we need to 0.5 million to 3 million a year for a good four or five years to get the process going. that does not get you back to where you were but it gets you way ahead of where we are right now and we are not doing even that. so, i am going to stop there because i wanted to focus on the short run and the labor market. we have some longer run issues that we know are out there. we have a deficit and debt problem that the congress is calling to be focusing on of the next couple of months it -- hopefully -- and hopefully we will be productive coming to some sort of resolution on how to begin to address that problem. we also have a situation with the fed and the monetary policy

issues. we have heard recently from mr. bernanke and a light of the question is, are we going to get qe2. i now think we will but i do not think it will matter because when you look at qe2, what you saw it is something very focused on helping the banking system and in turn shoring up the stock market but very little impact on overall gdp growth. and the money supply, by the way. you talk about that people are worried the fed at's policy will be inflationary but it can't be if it does not affect the money supply. the reserve position most primarily affected was the excess reserve position. what it means is the banks held these as idle cash reserves and not put them into loans or money supply increases, therefore it will not be inflationary but it did not in fact help gdp growth that much. i do not think the fed will continue because their intent, i believe, was to shore up the banking system. i think it was a successful

approach. i think they let everybody sit blissfully in their ignorance because what they were doing was re-liquefying the banking system and at the same time providing the banking system a ready supply of profits because they paid a positive margin on the borrowing versus the reserves bread. -- reserve spread. it pumped capital and retained earnings in the banking system. i don't think they will do it again because i don't think the banking system needs of the help. it is the economy that needs help now. what they are going to try to do is try to figure out ways to get the banks to begin lending out more of the excess reserves, which will have the impact on the money-supply and gdp growth. i think they will be fairly judicious. and i do not think it will be a major driver of gdp growth in the next year or year and a half. i will stop there and turn it over to randy.

>> thanks, marty. in view of the time constraints i would like to direct you to the material in your press packets, an overview of our activities in health care and pension area, and the long list of regulations in the pipeline the chamber is working on, along with a letter to the chairman to -- providing a overview of everything going on with the national labor relations board. i will touch on it today but it is a little too complicated to draw down in detail. marty provided the macro overview and i provide the microbe. i do that because there is a story to tell with facts and figures, but often the union's views labor day not just to talk about their agenda, frankly, but also an opportunity to go after and lawyers, often in an unfair way, in my view. want to direct your attention to the fact sheet on workplace

benefits. it is true, it is tough times, tough for employees, particularly those who lost their jobs, but employers also. we are still in a situation where employers are providing american something close to -- health care, close to 170 million americans, providing some storm of pension benefits, whether defined contributions or benefits to well over 100 million americans, they're spending upwards of a trillion in wages and compensation. something like $1.50 trillion in benefits. that is in today's economy. looking back even a year when the economy was arguably in a worse situation. i just want to say for the record that employers are trying to do the best they can for employees in these tough economic times. that is a story that often gets lost and labor day that the unions often coincidently don't bring up. i also want to mention, and

frankly, i have been surprised -- surveys have shown repeatedly high level of satisfaction of employees and the work fit -- workplace. one came out may 31. 87.5% of those employed surveyed expressed between high satisfaction and a fairly high level of satisfaction with their jobs. the poll noted it was down from 89.4%. but still, 2% drop. i think it's given our economic times, a rate around 87% is worth noting. a survey by the university of chicago national opinion research center came in at about 86% of very satisfied or moderately satisfied. i think it belies some of the claims by many that employers are cutting corners without reason, that they are insensitive to the needs of their employees. employers need their employees to compete, and they are well aware of that.

a quote on healthcare it -- i just want to mention, 80% of those with employer coverage -- the lucky ones with employer coverage -- they say their overall experiences with the current plan have been positive, including 42% very positive. one out of tens saying the overall experience was negative. this was a recent survey and it goes to the fact that employers what are trying to provide quality health care to employees. they are not just simply raising premiums and cutting benefits but exploring creative ideas like well as programs. -- wellness programs. it's talking about the nlrb later -- you will hear and the next couple of days, we need to change the rules of vote road of the board even though they have been there since the 1940's, but we need to change the rules of the road because the rate of unionization has fallen.

employers are no longer the employers of 1912 and made famous in "the jungle" but fairly decent men and women trying to run a business and they treat their employees fairly well. that is the reason most employees choose not to join a union or feel one is not necessarily. obviously the federal government stepped in with statutes to provide the basic protections that the not exist in the past. going back to the theme of job growth. if you look in your packet, you will see a long list of labor and and when the regulations that we are looking at in the chamber. if you had insomnia, feel free to read the package. these are the only ones of the chamber is work in one. there are the ones. there are 67. i had my staff go through and say how many of those are pages and the code of federal regulations, the federal register, that we've as employers and the real world would have to go through to act

-- understand exactly what is coming out of this administration. it is many, and it comes out to 1910 pages. you might say, that is not so many. hopefully you will say it is quite a few. if you think is not so many, this is one page dealing with the proposed health-care regulations on administrative appeals. i can tell you, going through that -- it is complicated stuff. this is only one page out of over 1900 that we have to deal with here at the chamber, but all employers across the country have to deal with it and they want to understand what is going on in the regulatory sphere. many say, to heck with it, i don't understand it, so i am afraid and i will not hire and i will hold back. there is a common theme in these regulations. one can debate the merits. i am sure i would have a disagreement over at the board regarding the posting ranks and with phyllis over at the pension

benefits security administration over certain regulations, but the one common theme of these 67 regulations is none of these help job growth except for lawyers and consultants. i would ask the administration, as tom did, in this kind of environment, what the heck is going on here with regard to the white house says one thing but the people below the white house level are pumping out regulations that create uncertainty and it cost a lot of money. you might say how much money? we are not sure. but i can tell you the department of labor and other agencies typically under estimate the cost of these regulations and leave out -- i spent six years at the department of labour -- they leave out little things that are important. for example, one regulation says you must train your employees on this regulation and would estimate it would take a half- hour or. it is more like two hours. the point is, and as regulation and the titular the department of our did not cost out what it

might cost the employer. a half-hour of time away from the job has a cost impact for any employer concerned about any level of productivity. that is just a small example. if i do share a regulation -- let out multiple areas of coverage light ira's and small pension plans that would have to comply with an -- new regulation and assume, well, we can't figure it out so we will not bother and say it is zero. under the nlrb posting regulation of that i will talk about in a little bit, it covers literally every employer except for the smallest. the national labor relations board assumes no cost at all for every employer except for those very few hit with the unionization campaign. i can come back and say this is what the cost are. my point is these agencies typically underestimate the

cost -- it is and the normal course of business but in this time of the economy i think it is troublesome. we will go through those as we comment on the regulations. but i want to bring it to your attention. i think it is an indicative -- it indicates the arrogance of these agencies as they pump out these new initiatives. the national labor relations board had been in the press lately. there was a letter in your packet addressed to chairmen klein that goes through the case is pending. i will not go through them there. case. famous boeing k there will be legislation on capitol hill to reverse the case, to prevent the board going forward with a remedy that would require the company to close down in charlotte and go to washington.

i think the dam has broken. we will see a lot of new cases coming out. i think the letter to chairman klein paints a good mosaic of not just the three or four cases the press focuses on the what is really going on at the agency over there. i'd think you will see that what we see in the press is just the tip of the iceberg, a lot of other things that unbearably seem to be directed at one thing, which is, make it easy to organize. make it tougher for employers to talk about their side of the case with regard to why unionization could be bad, often at the expense of employee in free choice. with regard to agency arrogance, i do want to talk about a little about what is often a sacred cow, the equal employment opportunity commission and also mentioned the other area of the law, enforcement, that often people don't want -- focus on. this is often below the radar screen. and yet we have seen their --

there situation where they have gone after employers and basically have taken it to a new level where it is sue first and take questions later. some companies have taken eeoc to court and they have had to pay attorneys' fees, $2.6 million in one case, two runs and $25,000 in attorneys' fees to another company. this is the situation with the underlying cause of action is extremely for the list. courts rarely step in and did this. real money coming out of the taxpayers market. it comes out of the eeoc budget but out of the taxpayers' pockets, and it takes them away from legitimate cases it can be pursuing. we can talk about the law, statutes, and regulations but the murky area of enforcement often gets lost. you could at the best laws in the world but if you have an agency of using its discretion bigot be just as bad as a bad

law. it costs employers real-time and money which takes away from their ability to create jobs. that is just a few cases. you could imagine a number of employers just confronted with an agency that they can't afford to fight and they are bludgeoned and sediment. we have seen similar action with contract compliance programs. i am just going to mention immigration at some point. tourism, tom brought it up. there is big money involved. marty is right. this is the time to come to the united states and spend money but what we are seeing is a lot of tourism, to france and england, particularly from brazil and china, because it is increasingly hard to get to the united states, increasingly hard, particularly that you are from a country that is not a visa waiver program to get a b-1 or b-2 music. why is this going on, we are not sure. but we are seeing a slowdown but i can guess why. it is real money out of the pockets of american businesses

and something we have a strong coalition on and will be going after. we do support mandatory e- verification laws that will likely hit the house floor next month. a controversial position for the chamber. there we see that as a down payment on other types of emigration reforms, if the bill can get to the house. health care -- what's done is done. it's interesting. you look at the public surveys and see an increasing declining support for the bill, even among democrats. the more people about it, the less they like it. it is unfortunate we are in a situation we are in. we are working on several improvements, part of the early the elimination of the employer mandate. we will be having a press conference on that. other areas, like taxes, the

non-deductibility under the flexible spending account. the real action there, until there's a change in the white house will be in the regulatory area. they have, and some areas, the administration has worked with us. in other areas, they have been less than friendly. health care is one of the ongoing issues we will have to deal with. it's in the courts. it's in the regulatory regime. we will continue to deal with it. we have testified on it many times. our predictions, when we testified three years ago, have turned out to be true. that is, it will result in job loss and less coverage for employees as some employers drop their plans and move their employees into exchanges. it is unfortunate, i think the president did not more honestly talk about the deal to begin with. this is not about saving costs.

it's about covering more people. that is the deal on the table. it's not about saving costs. the legislation was never about controlling costs. i think there's a little bit of -- it is a lot of the land and we are dealing with it as best we can. i'm not going to talk about pensions. i could. it is 11:00. >> hi. catherine lewis. i'm here for "fortune" and i wanted to ask you -- the question of job creation, when you look at the state of the only bright spot is often the profits of private companies. as much as $1 trillion is on the

sidelines waiting to be invested, waiting to create jobs. why isn't that money being spent by companies to invest in the future or to create jobs? >> as i said during my presentation, companies do not invest and hire people just because they have cash on hand. they hire people because they can put those people to work producing a product, good, or service that they can sell at a profit. that's what they do. right now, the economy is not presenting that opportunity. there's no exigency in the market right now. businesses respond to competition. if somebody were taking their market, invading their market share, selling products to their customers, taking those customers away, they would be responding very aggressively. that is not happening. if you really want to get

businesses to spend that money, give them a reason to spend it, not a part-time subsidy that says, "hire a personnel and we will give you a break for six months on their salary." that business has to weigh the following equation. cam that business to generate revenue -- can that person generate revenue through the life of the employment, not just the six months, that warrants the salary we pay them? if the answer is no or we are not sure, then you do not hire them. that's really what's holding it back. as soon as businesses start to see the market working and the economy working, then they will want to step in and step in quickly to get ahead of the game. thatonly going to take spark. it's not like you have to finance the whole process.

the money is there to finance the expansion. what we need is the spark. it is difficult. that's the least that economists know about the economy, it occurs at the turning 0.3 is always a chicken and egg -- it occurs at a turning point. it is always a chicken and egg thing. with as much uncertainty as we're having now in the economy, it's much more the latter than the former. everybody talks about uncertainty. a lot of people say, "businesses are always operating in a certain environments." that is true. i liken it to one of my favorite sports and that is standing at the craps table. when you look at the dice, you do not know what is coming up. i do not know what is coming up. you know what the rules of the

game are. you know what the odds are. people will stand up there and that into adverse odds again and again and again and again because they know the odds and they know the game. if you took the same game and said, "ok, before every role of the dice, i'm going to cover up one of the spots," now what is the betting going to be? you would find a whole lot less people willing to play that game than the game that we all know and either love or despise, as the case may be, on any given night. that's what's happened to the uncertainty in this economy. because of the rule changes, businesses and not only have to deal with the vagaries in the economy, they have to deal with the vagaries in the rules of the game. that adds a level of uncertainty

that many are incapable or unwilling to take on. when you see that, you can see that there are compound levels of uncertainty. what we're facing now is a very, very high level of compounding nine dealing with that uncertainty -- compounding in dealing with that uncertainty. >> going into an election year, do you think it will take until next november until there's a clear certain path forward? do you have a scenario where there could be some of that certainty for businesses to start to hire before the next 14 months? >> i am not a big fan of campaign speeches and i do not believe most of them. they are more for entertainment value than anything else. i think that as you see the campaign for and you see the platform is being discussed, you may get a feeling that some of the longer run uncertainty is changing. as you see the various

candidates getting narrowed down and the odds on the outcome been posted -- outcome been posted more often, you may see some changes. in all likelihood, it will take some time. >> thank you. >> veronica smith. how does the chamber view the infrastructure bank? what is the chamber's view on this. >> infrastructure bank is an interesting concept, and if structured appropriately, could work quite well. the questions are, what is the exact structure? what is the funding?

there's that old commercial that you cannot fool mother nature. you have an economy that's not fooled easily either. robbing peter to pay paul to somehow provide a better bang for your buck -- most times, it does not work. when you look at the infrastructure bank, the concept is great. public-private partnerships that pyramid private money with public money to get a bigger pie -- that makes sense, as well. it will depend on how it is structured, what the rules are, what types of limitations there are, how much, and what kind of a return of crews to the bait the private

sector? it's almost impossible to say. conceptually, it is fine. the devil is always in the detail. >> [inaudible] any particular plans with the white house? >> not on the infrastructure bank. >> josh with "politico." how do you see the political environment shaping the outcomes you talked about today? how do you see it moving on the [inaudible] >> labor issues? >> regulatory issues. you talked about trade. the whole host, the whole basket. tourism, you name it. can you hear me better? >> we can hear you.

>> if you focus on the micro, on the national labor relations board, the well has been poisoned to such a degree that no candidate could pass -- no candidate this administration would offer up with us during the senate in terms of an additional point to the national labor relations board. i do think that is indicative of a very -- i guess, more partisan situation on capitol hill then i saw when i was there for 10 years. we are working on some solutions in the appropriations bill on a lot of these regulatory issues. i do think that in the area of regulatory relief, you will see some bipartisan support for bills that will adopt some of the ideas the president has put

in his executive orders. there is a bipartisan recognition that there are too many regulations coming out of this administration, and we need to slow things down. the nlrb's traditional issues has become overly part of this. i think there will be bipartisan solutions, at least to provide temporary relief to the employment community. tourism is a tough one. it is wrapped up in national security. i think some people on the hill -- is tough for us to quantify what exactly the problem is that the state department in terms of delays. we have our studies, but a lot of people think we're going to

sacrifice national security. we cannot do both. we have left a lot of money on the table. there's a lot of tours and going to other countries. it is something congress needs to address. barrons."om "va do you think the fed will discontinue paying interest on these idle reserves? would that be a good thing or a non-event? >> this computer is locked up or i would show you a slight. the excess reserve positions of the commercial banks -- reserves that do not have to be held to up to demand deposits, they normally run about $2 billion. the said engaged in its

activities to liquefy the system, they have risen. the fed engineered that. the law changed and they were allowed to pay interest on deposits held at the fed. by adjusting the interest they pay on the deposits versus what they charge that the borrowing window, you can encourage or discourage the holding of that type of asset. they very much encouraged the assets. they encouraged the banks to hold these things as idle reserves. it gives the banks more liquidity. when the world is falling apart around you, liquidity is king. that's what they wanted the system to hold. at the same time, it provides a profit stream, which goes into retained earnings and bolsters capital over time. i think that was as much of the

intent of qe1, qe2, and everything else. it was quite successful. going forward, the fed can do a couple of things. they can unwind their portfolio and at the same time play with their rates to get the banks to essentially just -- to expunge the excess reserve position. in other words, they turned around and pay the money back to the fed. the bounce sheet of the fed would shrink and the excess reserve position would shrink, theoretically. i believe, at some point, the fed will try to do that. why? that will not have a big negative impact on the economy. the fed is not going to reduce the money supply, and reduce the liquidity, of the economy. they will reduce the liquidity of the banking system. problem is that has never been

done before. in one of my trips to las vegas, i was dragged away from my favorite craps tables to see one of those performances with a swing through the air in the dark. it was amazing precision. you never get to see that crashed that nascar fans like myself are always waiting to see. everybody goes happy at the end -- goes home happy at the end. the fed has the same sort of process. they have the same intricacy in unwinding the reserve position. they have not had the practice. the people that put on the shows have had practice. they will have to do this one without practice. i'd think they have very good people and very smart people. i think they understand the delicacy of the problem they face. i think it will be a little bit of a trial and error.

it has not started yet. i think bernanke said in his presentation after the last fomc meeting -- we are going to keep these rates low for a long time. he did not really speak to unwinding the portfolio. i think we will begin to seek them doing that a low but sooner than 2013, which was the -- do that a little bit sooner than 2013, which was the rate target. they will wait to start until they see a little bit more growth. nobody wants to start this kind of delicate surgery when the patient is in such poor state of overall health. you wait until the economy picks up a little bit. i would expect maybe in a year

from now, we will start to see them working on this process. in the meantime, i am not expecting to see qe3 for the simple reason that if i am at all right as to why they did qe2, there's no reason for qe3. qe2 did not impact the economy. it did not impact the money supply's. the money supply shows none of the sharp increases during that entire fed process that you would have expected, if it was running through the normal type of transmission mechanism where base goes up, money supply goes up, expenditures, and the economy go up. that's the kind of classical approach to monetary policy. that was not evident. did they really not notice that their stuff was not having a big impact, or was it having an impact on what they cared about,

which was underpinning the banking system, which was vitally important to the economy, but does not necessarily result in gdp growth. >> thank you. leslie from mcclatchy newspapers. can you talk about what you would like to see out of the president's jobs package next week? you mentioned the much maligned stimulus package might not have been as bad as it was perceived. does that mean the chamber would support some kind of stimulus spending in this jobs package? >> we did support the original stimulus package. we thought the original description of 40% tax cuts and 60% spending on infrastructure was the right mix. that's not what we saw. it does appear, and we've always felt, that the stimulus package had a positive impact. it was not a panacea. it was a positive impact. and the stated at the depths of

the downturn as it was, we believe it was the right thing to do. we believe it would have had a bigger impact had it been done better. would we support another one at this time? the fiscal situation has changed. the economic situation has changed. at the time that was instituted, we were in a freefall. we were headed down. as we saw from the revised data -- heading down a lot further and a lot faster than we originally thought. in that environment, that was the right call. we are now looking at an economy that is sputtering. it's not gaining momentum, but is not in a recession. it is not falling into a deeper recession. while the chances of a recession are higher, the probabilities are higher than they have been in the past six or eight months, they are not 50/50. might be one in three, one in four.

given that backdrop and given our fiscal problems, i do not think you could justify the type of fiscal stimulus the way that we did in the prior case. looking forward, i think that if you are going to look to the fiscal area, the place to do it is in tax reform. complete tax restructuring. put in a tax code that has the proper incentives, that does not penalize savings, that does not penalize investments, that encourages expansion and irene, capital appreciation, and the like. a tax code like that could still raise the same amount or more money -- revenue. do it in a way that does not have the negative impact on the economy that an income taxation -- one that we are not competitive with the rest of the

world -- does to an economy. you can get the same amount or more money in a way that has a much less negative impact on the economy than the way we do it. >> turning back specifically to the labour market and the 14 million employed americans who are beginning to feel desperate, it's my impression that the bonds of power -- and the balance of power, employers had the upper hand. do you agree with that assessment that workers are, at this point in our economic less able to negotiate? do you see that changing, or is it part of a trend in our broader labor market? >> i will answer the first

question and like the trend situation go to randy. in terms of the current market, yes. you are absolutely correct in a very clinical way. when you have significant excess and 9.1% unemployment qualifies as significant excess supply, the provider of the labor has less negotiating power than the commander of the labor. we are starting to see the skill match-up running short. we have anecdotal evidence that people would hire 25 people if they could find the right skill set. they cannot find that skill set, in part because the labour mobility has been impacted by the bad housing market. where someone might have moved from chicago to poughkeepsie to

take on a technical manufacturing position, they cannot afford to do that because they're under water in their current home. you are seeing in the labour negativelylity being impacted by the housing market. in many ways, the skill mismatch is shifting the advantage back to the provider of the labor, to the individual who can move and thus have the skill set. in general, and excess supply situation with certain pockets exhibiting a short supply of specific types of labor. >> yeah, the only generality that can be made -- for those people who have a high school degree or less, they tend to be more expandable pin because

they're very low-skilled. surveys will show that the unemployment rate fall dramatically. we are experiencing reports that in manufacturing, they cannot find people with the skills they need. on september 28, we will be having a conference here led by mayor bloomberg to focus on that issue. it's not limited to computer sciences. for example, we have a company that cannot find skilled welders. they do not fall within the programs. it is hard to make generalizations about the state of the economy.

it is a continuing problem, which will increase, as the economy does get better. one reason the chamber is actively involved in domestic education issues, but also immigration. >> i have a question for marty. how much of the economy do you think the debt ceiling deliberations -- some people have pointed to that as to why consumer confidence was down. do you think it caused much harm to the economy? going forward, and do you think -- house important is it for this joint committee to come up with a solution from an economic standpoint? >> i think it had a big impact

on consumer confidence. we have not seen the full impact down the road. we got a credit downgrading from one agency only, because of the impasse. that was a kind of political downgrading of the market blew off. they said it was politics. if you're going to sit there and be offended, as it were, by our political system and the way we bicker and argue and take everything to the last minute, then, yes, this process was really offensive to you. the markets understand that. while it is not pretty, it's come to be a process we all know and love. everybody expected it to come down to the 11th hour. it did come down to the 11th hour. one ratings company says that means we are politically

dysfunctional. i think we have always been politically dysfunctional to a point, but we are getting pretty good at the political this functionality over two hundred years. the next question, where do we go from here? can we continue to act that way and even more so and not have it have real the fax? no, at some point, you have to show how the task can get done. the task that was assigned to find $1.5 trillion in spending cuts is not insurmountable. the numbers that have been discussed in this whole process encompass that aspect. the problem is that we need even more than that and we all know it. do i think it's possible for this group to get together and that if this group does not get together there will be significant ramifications? yes, i think there are. if they do get together and get

$1.5 trillion, there will be immediate criticism that they did not get more and that more is needed. that criticism, while somewhat untimely, is correct. they do need more. we have suggested they go beyond the directive and that they also look at fundamental tax reforms. we think there are ways to raise revenue. there are a variety of process these. there are permitting issues and things like that. also, through a more efficient tax code that would expand the base and provide for a more efficient collection, and, therefore, a higher amount of taxes without having any more negative impact. we have said we think you should do both. they have got to get the $1.5 trillion. if they do not get that, you will see other companies. moody's already alluded to the fact that they will be watching

the process carefully. i think there could be more fundamental ramifications, if they do not get the $1.5 trillion. >> thank you so much for coming. have a good afternoon. c-span.o [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011]

>> we will be covering other jobs related events today,

including the afl-cio holding its annual labor day press event. the president of the afl-cio, richard trumka, among the speakers. also covering an event with the republican presidential candidate, former utah jon huntsman. he will be speaking in new hampshire. news reports say he will call for sweeping tax changes. we are covering that event and we will show that to you later in our program scheduled. in a moment, president obama's comments from the white house ahead of his speech next week on jobs. also in washington today, the justice department says they have filed a suit to block at&t's $39 billion deal to buy t-mobile. the government contends that the acquisition would reduce

competition and raise prices. more details about that later in our program scheduled. as we mentioned, president obama called on congress earlier today to pass a clean extension of the surface transportation bill and the federal aviation administration reauthorization. he spoke at the white house for about 10 minutes.

>> ladies and gentlemen, the president of the united states. >> good morning, everybody. please have a seat. i want to say a few words about an issue that affects thousands of american workers, as well as millions of americans who drive on our nation's roads and bridges every single day. at the end of september, if congress doesn't act, the transportation bill will expire. this bill provides funding for highway construction, bridge repair, mass-transit systems, and other essential projects that keep our people and our commerce moving quickly and safely. and for construction workers and families across the country, it represents the difference between making ends meet and not making ends meet.

if we allow the transportation bill to expire, over 4000 workers will be immediately furloughed without pay. if it is delayed for just 10 days, it will lose nearly $1 billion in highway funding. that is money we can never get back. if it is delayed even longer, almost 1 million workers could lose their jobs over the next year. that includes some of the people behind me today. adam and chris are with the federal highway administration. hector and austin work for the fort myers construction company. if we do not extend this bill by the end of september, they will all be out of a job just because of politics in washington. that is not acceptable. that is inexcusable to put more jobs at risk in the industry

that has already been one of the hardest hit over the last decade. it is inexcusable to cut off necessary investments at a time when so many of our highways are choked with congestion, when so many of our bridges are in need of repair, when so many commuters depend on reliable public transit, and when travel and shipping delays caused businesses billions of dollars every single year. if this story sounds familiar, that is because we have heard it before. just a few weeks ago, congress refused to act on another bill. typically a routine bill that would have ended up pulling thousands of aviation workers off the job and the leading necessary airport improvement projects across the country. once congress got their act together, the only funded the faa until september 16. that's why when they come back next month, not only do they

need to pass the transportation bill, they also have to pass a clean extension of that at a a bill -- of that faa bill. at a time when a lot of people in washington are talking about creating jobs, it's time to stop the political gamesmanship that can actually cost us hundreds of thousands of jobs. this should not be a democratic or republican issue. this transportation bill has been renewed seven times in the last two years alone. that's why my secretary of transportation, a republican, is with me today, along with david from the chamber of commerce. and richard trumka of the afl- cio -- two organizations that do not always see eye to eye. they agree how important it is for our economy that congress act now. i am calling on congress, as

soon as they come back, and to pass a clean extension of the surface transportation bill, a clean extension of the faa bill to give americans across the country confidence. to eliminate waste, to give states more control of the projects that are right for them, and to make sure we're getting better results from the money we spend. we need to stop funding projects based on whose districts there in and start finding them on how much could they will do for the american people -- start funding them on how much could they will do for the american people. no more bridges to know where. no more projects that are funded because somebody is pulling strings. we need to do this in a way to get the private sector more involved. we are going to put construction workers back to work right now doing the work america needs done, not just to boost our

economy this year, but for the next 20 years. finally, in keeping with the recommendation from my jobs council, today i'm directing certain federal agencies to identify high priority infrastructure projects that can put people back to work. these projects are already funded, but with some focused attention, we could expedite the reviews and permitting needed to get construction under way more quickly, while still protecting safety, public health, and the environment. tomorrow, in dallas, my jobs council will meet with local business owners and other people about what we have done so far to rebuild our infrastructure and what we can do to make sure that america is moving even faster in getting people back to work. that is what we are going to need to do in the short term to keep people on the job, to keep vital projects moving forward, fund projects that are already under way in a smarter way.

we know when it comes to our nation's infrastructure, we should be leading the world. 10 years ago, we were 6th globally. today, 23rd. everybody can see the consequence. that is unacceptable for a nation that has always dreamed big and built big. it is unacceptable when countries like china are building high-speed rail networks and gleaming new airports, while more than 1 million construction workers who could be doing the same thing are unemployed in america. when congress is back next week, in addition to passing the screen extensions to prevent any

halt on existing work -- passing these clean extensions to prevent any halt on existing work, we will have to look at better ports, a it smarter electric grid, high-speed internet, and high-speed rail. at a time when workers are unemployed, the best time to make those investments is right now, not once another levy fails or bridge falls. right now is when we need to be making these decisions. now is the time for congress to extend the transportation bill, keep our workers on the job. now is the time to put our country before party and give certainty to the people were just trying to get by. is work to be done and there are workers ready to do it. that's why i expect congress to act immediately. to all the folks who are here on the stage, thank you for all the outstanding work you are doing in helping maintain our nation's

infrastructure. thank you very much, everybody. [applause] [applause] >> president obama from about one hour ago. also within the last hour, the justice department announced its filing an antitrust lawsuit to block the proposed merger of at&t and t-mobile. in a news conference this saiding, james cole

it would result in tens of millions of consumers across the u.s. facing higher prices, fewer choices, and lower product -- or quality products. one of the recent hearings held on that. you can find that online. the news conference happened this morning. we will show that to you in our program schedule. also, take a look at our poll posted on our "washington journal" facebook page. messrs. if they plan to spend more or less money over the next six months. so far, 40 said they would spend more. 220 said they would spend less. 78 vots said about the same -- 78 votes said about the same.

they have been bringing you a series on the weather. they will be talking about the role of noaa on thursday. on friday, the role of the national weather service. what's more, is rearing this evening at 7:15 on c-span2. >> he is a partisan guy who wants to unite people tereus all of the problems of the era -- unite people. why we cannot elect him is the same reason we went to war. >> he had the misfortune of running against the great military hero, dwight eisenhower. way not think there's any adam stevenson -- adlai stephenson could have won. >> he lost overwhelmingly to

herbert hoover, but pave the way for franklin roosevelt. there are 14 people in this series, many of whom the worst i've never heard of, but all of whom they will find fascinating and surprising. >> history professor gene baker, carl cannon, and richard norton smith talk about the 14 men who ran for president and lost, friday at 8:00 p.m. eastern and pacific. it's a preview of "the contenders." >> watch more video of the candidates, see what political reporters are saying, and track the latest and campaign contributions with campaign

2012. it helps you navigate the latest polling data and there are links to c-span partners. c-span.org this is. /-- this is all at c-span.org/ campaign2012. >> alan west held a town hall meeting, talking about the middle east peace process. he was asked questions about the economy, jobs, the deficit, and tax reform. this is one hour and 45 minutes. [applause] >>? >> i'm going to give you guys an idea of how this will flow. first, a presentation of the colors by the honor guard.

on. the mayor will make some opening remarks. we will have a q&a session. with that, we will get started and present the colors.

>> i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic, one nation, under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> ♪ o say can you see by the dawn's early light what so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming whose broad stripes and bright stars

thro' the perilous fight o'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming and the rockets' red glare the bombs bursting in air gave proof thro' the night that our flag was still there o say does that star spangled banner yet wave o'er the land of the free and the home of the brave? ♪

[applause] >> good afternoon.

welcome to palm beach gardens and thank you for coming out in this wonderful weather we're having today to see our congressman. i feel that one of the most important duties of an elected official is to meet with his constituents, discuss ideas, and bring that back to the governing body, and make good decisions on our behalf. i would like to commend allen west for coming out here and doing that. this is a job of his. i would like to commend him for coming here and meeting with us today so that he can take our ideas and thoughts back to washington and better represent us. congressman allen west proudly served the constituents of the district, encompassing parts of palm beach county. born and raised in atlanta, in

the same neighborhood where dr. martin luther king once preached. his father was a corporal in the u.s. army and served in world war ii. his mother, the outspoken and lovable [inaudible] worked on [inaudible] before retiring as an army colonel, colonel allen west was a field officer in operation desert storm. in operation iraqi freedom, he was a battalion commander for the army's fourth infantry. in afghanistan, he trained afghan officers to take on the responsibility of securing their own country. in 2004, after serving in the army, he retired from the military and brought his wife,

angela, and their two daughters, to south florida to be closer to his wife's family. congressman west taught high school for one year and then returned to afghanistan as a civilian adviser. congressman west was honored to be able to continue his oath of office to this country when he was elected as a representative to the united states congress. he is wearing a very nice suit. [laughter] his commitment to protect the people of the united states is still his mission. in his free time, he enjoys -- i'm having a hard time saying this. tennessee volunteers. [laughter] certified scuba diver, a , and without

further ado, i would like to introduce our congressman, allen west. [applause] >> thank you so much. thank you to the men and women who serve to protect each and everyone of you here in palm beach gardens. the most important thing is you and your safety and your security, especially with what we saw happen back in january with giffords. it was an incredible honor to see her back casting that final vote before we left on recess. that's an incredible merkel. -- that is an incredible

miracle. everyone see the cameras that are around here? you all are being taped for c- span. you will be on c-span some time. make sure you sit up straight. the world is watching us. obviously, something happened while i was away and israel. i did a little media interview and they asked me if i was going to start charging people to come to town hall meetings. [laughter] i do not know who is doing that. maybe i could pick up a couple of dollars here and there and make sure i can go to chick- fil-a afterwards. it's very important that we let you know our perspectives. today i want to give you a little additional insight. i just got back from an eight- day trip in israel. while we were over there, we were talking about earthquakes, and of course hurricane irene. some very serious things are

happening in israel that we need to pay close attention to. it does affect our future national security and our relationship with our staunchest ally in the middle east, which is israel. let me see if i can make this thing work. we have two offices. the office that serves you in north palm beach county is located just south of the intersection of belvedere and dixie highway. you can see it right there. if you're in brouwer county, right off the i-95 exit. that is our for lauderdale office. ok. here we go. the month of august. one of the things i've been harping on, when we have that s&p downgrade, i believed we should have went back to

washington, d.c. and found additional spending cuts so we can make sure we can restore our credit rating. here we are in this last week in august. we will head back into session next week. i will head back to washington, d.c. on september 5. i have some duties on the house floor. august has been dedicated to members of congress to meet with their constituents, have town hall meetings, and make sure we keep them informed about what is going on. next slide. oh, i can do it. i told you i went to the university of tennessee. [laughter] let's talk about the budget control act. one of the things i did not like was this commission, this super committee. that's why i think it's important that we should have went back as soon as possible instead of pushing this back four or five weeks. there is spending that has to be

curtailed in washington, d.c., and i think it's pretty sad that we have to have this nuclear option that hangs over our heads if we do not find the additional spending in washington, d.c., such as major cuts to medicare and to our defense system. i do not want to see that happen. when i look at what we were able to do, it's the first time in history of the united states that the debt ceiling was raised and we did say we would have spending cuts involved. it was better than not having spending cuts at all. it sets a precedent as we go forward that no one can ever talk about raising the debt ceiling without having matching spending cuts in washington, d.c. it avoided what could have been a very bad situation as far as the default and the raising of our interest rates. those are not the kinds of things i want to happen, especially when we have so many people in the united states of america, especially in south florida, that are struggling. foreclosure rates are high.

the last thing you need is another hot coal heaped upon you. the other thing we must stay away from -- now is not the time for tax increases. i will show you some numbers to let you know why we do not need tax increases. now's the time to talk about reforming our tax system and our tax code. we will talk specifically about that. the thing that i want everyone to understand -- one year ago, coming out of washington, d.c., everyone was upset about a $2 trillion health-care law. now everyone in the united states of america is really upset about not cutting more spending. that is a change in the conversation in washington, d.c. you have an incredible apparatus in washington, d.c.. some of us know this phrase from the army. it's a self with the ice-cream

cone -- self-licking ice cream cone. it perpetuates itself. it's hard to take the candy out of the baby's mouth in washington, d.c., but we are getting to the point where we are doing it. the conversation is not about the conversation in washington d.c. is how we can cut back on spending. we have to do that. we are at a point with a $14.50 trillion debt, 73% of our gdp, and a federal government that is right now spending per gdp about 24%. that is why you have that separation between revenue and out late, creating a deficit. we are about to have our third straight year of a $1 trillion deficit in the united states of

america. $1.29 trillion. now we are estimating $1.50 trillion. gdp in this country in the first quarter was 4.3%. in the next quarter -- sorry, 0.4%. in the next quarter they estimated gdp was 1.4% and it was downgraded. compare that with china. china is growing at 9.5%. that is the danger of where we are at right now. i always like to show this. you have to understand that it is a culture that is not going to be changed in eight months. it takes 5 miles to turn around right now, but we are turning that wheel and starting that motion. that is what we have to stay

focused on. if we can continue to take incremental steps in the right direction, there is no way in eight months that we will rectify almost 30 years of fiscally irresponsible policies that have come out of washington, d.c. that is what we face. now, we have got to do something about our medicare programs. in 13 years, medicare is bankrupt. for people 55 years and older, the plan for proposal of reform does not touch any 155 years or older. if we do not do something for medicare right now, it will not be there for meet. even more so, it will love be there for people in medicare at this time. we have to start looking at the

viable solutions. we have to move away from this fee-for-service. south florida is ground zero for medicare waste and abuse. we have got to look at the means by which we can rectify that. right now there are medicare senior patrols. people in senior communities talking to each other about how we go out and share the things that we are saying. i had an opportunity to talk to a group of individuals that do the lab tests, psychological lab tests. they talked about the means by which we can streamline this program so that we do not have increased costs with these additional technologies. there are many ways by which we can improve the system.

our debt has slowly overtaken the gdp. any economist will tell you that when your debt to gdp ratio is 85%, you are about to destroy the economy. that is where we are. we have got to turn it around. we cannot get to the point where we go = " we are producing. 47% of the debt in the united states of america is held by foreign nations. 27% of that debt is held by china. interestingly enough, when i was in israel, i was a pretty peculiar visitors to israel while i was there. also there was the chief of the chinese liberation army. very strange. 47% of wagering households in

the united states of america pay no federal income taxes. that is a very dangerous statistic when you sit down and understand that we have a 53% pulling the wagon in this country. let's talk -- talk about the top 1% of wage earners, paying 87% of the taxes in the united states of america. the top 25% of wage earners in the united states of america pay 86% of the taxes in this country. it is not about sacrifice. we have got to make more people shareholders in the united states of america. that is why i believe the flat tax system is a great system. you have two deductions. child tax credit and mortgage

interest. why? we what farmers and we want them to have homes. if we could simplify the tax code, it would be very simple. $240 billion in two months is all that she would get. right now the federal government spends $3 billion per day. there is a spending problem in the united states of america. $3 billion to $4 billion per day is what the federal government spends. it is a revenue problem. that is why i said it is about extending the tax base and that is historically proven in the united states of america.

if you can curtail spending coming out of washington, d.c., the more money that we put into their pockets, guess what happens? it is about business services. if you are requesting more goods and services, small businesses are growing. with that the environment that we have, that is not what is happening. the united states has the second highest corporate tax rate in the world. combined with state level corporate taxes copper you are talking about 49% for corporations and businesses. corporate profits are up, but not in the united states. their upper overseas. if we are taking the corporate tax rate and bringing it down to 21%, at eliminating loopholes,

feeling out corporations and businesses with competitive tax rates, bringing it back to the united states of america, we could get back to doing what our small businesses want to do. bills did -- build businesses. higher americans. get back to manufacturing in this country. here are nine points that i have brought up that i think would be very helpful. we have got to find the additional spending cuts in washington, d.c.. it is not that hard to do. in my first 90 days i was able to find three programs in the department of defense that resulted in $800 million of savings over the next 10 years. if every single member of their did the exact same thing in whenever agency they had oversight of, and guess what

would happen with the debt. guess what would happen with of the deficit and spending in washington, d.c.? that is what we need to do. we do not have a budget. we are looking at 855 days since the united states of america has not operated with a budget. can you run a household that way? a business? nothing has come out of the senate as far as a budget. nothing has been passed in the house and in terms of jobs bills. no one can run households the way that we run the federal government right now. we have had 300 -- $200 to $300 of those programs coming out in the report this year. a great place to start.

with far more regulatory systems in the month of july, about 600 new regulations were sent back to the federal government. 600 regulations that would cost businesses of words of $10 billion in compliance. if we continue in this path, we will preclude businesses from being able to go -- grow. things like the epa, saying that farmers and municipalities need to have runoff water to purify rain water, or they will be fined, those of the things coming out of washington, d.c. that are frustrating our businesses. this is some of the inaction we have had here recently. nothing is getting through to

the senate. kind of the reason why i was told i should run for the senate, i said i should do some work, because i do not know what these guys are doing. here is a flow chart. this proposed 2012 budget failed in the senate. the plan went over to the senate and sat there. there are 12 appropriations bills that have to be passed for it to operate itself. so far in the house, we have only past six of those. the interior bill must be taken up when we get back. the senate has only test one of those appropriations bills. what will happen when we get back up there? we will not be able to finish

the other six bills in the house. definitely it will not be completed in the senate. there will lead to be a continuing resolution. that is why congress has of 14% approval rating. we know what we are supposed to do, yet we are failing. i grew up in an organization called the united states military that says that we do not go home until the mission is accomplished. but that is not how things operate in washington, d.c.. that is what you will see through september. am i optimistic about it? i guess. when i come before your faces, i see americans. i know that anytime america is pushed into a corner, with some churchill once said that americans will eventually do the right thing after they have

tried everything else. that is why the only person not an american that we named a navy war vessel after. but he is absolutely right. this is how i see this battlefield. if any of you have ever read the book "the killer angels," or if you ever saw the film "gettysburg," you can understand what i am talking about. now is the time we are trying to find the holding action. by -- at gettysburg he knew he could not defeat the entire army, but he knew that if he can hold this piece of high ground, he could delay and a fine time for the army of the potomac to link up with them. then they could possibly defeat the army of northern virginia. which, to that point, had never

lost the battle. in the three days of getty's three -- gettysburg, thanks to a man like joshua lawrence chambers, who had that -- held that far right flank, they were able to defeat the army of northern virginia because of a foolish attack from the confederate general, who charged across an open field and lost 16,000 men in one day. this is how we have to stand in order to be able to fight this thing incrementally. like i said. we will not be able to turn this around in eight months. but if we can hold on and fight disaster, ask yourselves what made america great. that battle is coming in november of 2012. america will rediscover itself and we will set the course for a new and brighter future for this

great nation. you have got to believe in the trust, principles, and values that made this country great. that is what i stand for. about muchlet's talk of to israel. the american-education israeli fund sponsor the trip. the group that i went over with had 20 freshmen and four senior members. we were allowed to bring our spouses. it was my second trip, but my wife's first trip. we were not allowed into southern israel because of the rockets being fired from gaza at the time. i will tell you this, the people of israel are very appreciative to the people of the united states.

we provided them with the technology that would allow them to intercept a missile in flight. it has proven to be very successful when it engages, missiles and missile. it has been 100% accurate. the people of israel thanks you for that. [applause] now, the thing that we have to understand, why is there such an incredible bond between america and israel? we have a shared heritage. that is who we are. that shared heritage allowed this country to be established. that is a key part. the shared values that we have with israel of freedom and liberty, you see a pluralistic society in israel just like here. just the same as you see various

members across our society in the congress and senate, it is a commitment to democratic principles where the most important thing that you must understand is that america and israel do have a common enemy. those of the words coming out of the mouth of prime minister netanyahu. this islamic totalitarianism is what they are fighting against. we must understand that if israel goes, we are next. what this enemies seize is a smaller segment and a greater stake in. to than the smaller satan is israel, because of the bonaventure. we cannot allow that bonn to be broken. we were supposed to meet with president mahmoud abbas. i do not know if he had a

scheduling conflict, so we met with the prime minister. the thing that i question, coming away from listening to him during his speech, the one, during the time that i was there no one from the palestinian authority announced the terrorist attack. let me tell you about it. it claimed the lives of eight israelis. three of them were egyptian. when they traced the arrival to out of egypt, they went in under a very well coordinated ambush to kill eight israelis. afterwards, the rockets and mortars gave no word from the palestinian authority.

president of's put out a statement saying that he felt that israel was using, going into gaza, as a means to try to delegitimize votes for palestinian statehood. he would not even recognize the fact that israel had been attacked. we have got to have people that will recognize the existence of the state of israel, the mounting terrorist groups and terrorist acts. when people talk about aid to state solution, mahmoud abbas has not -- talk about what to state solution -- two state solution, mahmoud abbas has not been to gaza in five years. there's no connection between the west bank, hamas, and the gaza strip. none whatsoever. relate, what to are talking about is really probably a three state solution.

gaza is not going to be talking to the folks in ramallah. this is what it looks like. in a couple of countries out here, like turkey, then over here there is of somalia, and then back down is pakistan. that is israel. that small, little bastion of freedom and democracy in a sea of despot, dictators, theocrats, and autocrats. what is concerning israel right now? for the first time you have iranian warships trying to enter the suez canal after 30 years. egypt to broker this reconciliation package between hamas and fatah.

they met with the foreign minister to talk about some kind of agreement or settlement. we know what is happening in libya and in serbia. in the gaza strip you have coordinated groups of terrorist organizations. i m seven on, some of it was completely controlled by hezbollah. since the second war they have rearmed and refitted themselves with 50 rockets and missiles in southern lebanon. the united nations called it an intervention force in southern lebanon, this southern contingent. they are now refusing to go into these different towns and villages because hezbollah is attacking them. that is why israel has to have heights. golan

when you stand there and look across the sea of galilee, even understand its strategic importance. that is why israel needs to come to the realization, we have to come to the realization that their security is so important when you look at the greater neighborhood in which they live. turkey is finding themselves becoming more islamist and anti- israeli. we know that iran is the country with all of the unrest. we know that at the end of the year, american forces are supposed to leave iraq. in iraq the mighty army has taken itself once again based on support coming from iran. that is the state that israel is living in.

strategic death. there is a place that stands in israel, 22 miles, one piece the high ground dominating the entire coastal plain of israel, from tel of leave. 1.5 million israelis. inside the green line of the west bank. this is what we have to have. recognition of the state of israel and the sensation of terrorism. i had the opportunity to run around the whole time.

next month there is a critical event in the united nations. the united states must vote against it in the security council. united states will not continue to provide millions upon millions of dollars of support to the palestinian authority, which does not recognize of modern day state of israel. we have to dismantle the terrorist threat that threatens israel. the most emotional thing was when a woman came to greet us from southern israel, talking about how her child spends most of his day in a bomb shelter.

that is not a way to live. i do not think that any of us here want our children growing up in that type of environment. but that is the type of environment they are living in. with that being said, what are your questions? [applause] >> good afternoon. -[unintelligible] and in the legislative affairs director for palm beach county.

i work for the board of county commissioners and is my honor to be here to help moderate some of your questions. we have over 50 questions that were submitted. i apologize if we do not to to all of them. some of them were redundant. i have split the questions up into about eight different areas. including israel and some administrative questions. without further ado, i will get to as many of you as i can. if i say something we have already covered, just let me know and i will move on. starting with health care, what will you be able to do to remove obama-care as soon as possible? [applause]

>> as long as harry reid is the majority leader in the senate, nothing will happen with that. at 2013 to about 2018, they will be stock. they are trying to meet the american people up front. it is important that we can change that policy before 2013. talking about 159 government agencies and bureaucracies, those of the types of things that are going to kick in, going back to reform health care, doing it by using the right types of market principles that put you in charge of your health care, not the government. >> recent court cases over

constitutionality of obama care, what is your opinion? >> that the 11th circuit court of appeals and rule of individual mandate was unconstitutional. the commerce clause, the federal government does not have the authority to mandate to an individual citizen that they must purchase private sector commodities. some people like to point out automobile insurance, but the point is that you do not have to buy a car. if you buy a car and operate on public roads, you are required. the other option is that they have to purchase unless they are -- otherwise they are fine. i believe it will come to the supreme court sometime next year. >> this is supposed to be people asking questions. >> i am asking the people's

questions, sir. >> [inaudible] >> i would be happy to. >> [inaudible] >> i am happy to moderated serve. we will get to it as much as we can. the next question, from david, has questions about medicare. what types of things can you do to get medicare spending under control? >> one of the most important things is moving from the fee- for-service to the defined benefit. if it has to be based upon the income of the individual, right now people are going in with different services in medicare and they do not know what that bill is. often they see a service that is $200 and they will bill

medicare for $1,000. one of the most important things that we have to do is get rid of the defensive medicine being enacted by our doctors. doctors requiring people to have certain amounts of tests that are unnecessary, the reason they are doing that is for reform. this is not just for medicare, but for the entire system, tort reform, so that doctors can truly do what they want to do to protect the patients. we talked about fraud, waste, and abuse in the system. we have to rectify the billions of dollars that can be saved there. let's start talking to those medical professionals, like i did over here. how do we streamline and make sure that the co pay on seniors are less? every time that a senior goes in to get one of these pathology

tests, that is another co pay. all of a sudden you're 20% co pay, it adds up over time. those other types of things we need to talk to the professionals about. >> we have six questions regarding the middle -- military action going on around the world right now. why do you continue to finance these wars? >> you are looking at a man that served the things we should not be in libya. i was one of the most outspoken people about that. we have not supported -- we should not have supported any of those actions. after we found that osama bin laden had been killed in pakistan, i was one of the first people to say that we should cut off the money be sent to pakistan. 10 years ago, none of us would

have ever thought that their plans would have flown into buildings. we have a vote. whether or not you like that vote, we are going to do something about it. after iraq and afghanistan, the united states of america could do better in fighting this 21st century battle. it is not about occupation-style warfare. we need to be focused on where the enemy is. we are not responsible for fixing everything that is broken. [applause] but if you have an enemy that is about going to go away unless to crush it, if we do not get back to the point of understanding that sometimes the enemy has to be crushed, the last time the united states of america fought a total war where they were committed was world war ii. every time there is warfare,

there is residual a fax. did not do the job in vietnam? see what happens. guess what, 12 years later i was back over there. you have got to develop the right type of strategically removal will military that takes the fight to this enemy. 1990, the united states of america had 560 war vessels. today they have to wonder 83. -- 283. how can you defend the power of the nation? >> congressman, joe has questions about the consequences of loss of life, particularly in the united states surrounding the bankruptcy financing of these wars. your opinion on those consequences? >> when i look at the mandate of

the constitution, promoting the general welfare, providing for the common defense, securing the defenses of liberty, i can make you as prosperous as you want to be, but if i do not protect your security, what difference is it going to make? people that were going to work 10 years ago, the world changed on that day. if we can get back to having a government that understands its constitutionally mandated responsibility, we can set this straight as far as access. if we have a government that continues to create bureaucracies that never meet the purpose, there is only one reason we created this positive energy, to make the united states of america energy

independent. no one has ever been able to explain to me why we have a department of labor. what do they do? the department of education has grown? it is an inverse relationship. when we get someone who does not understand their responsibilities, then we have a federal government where you do not see. [applause] >> u.s. how we do that? >> yes. >> it is about making the hard decisions. i am telling upon, anything that does not meet -- is like the department of energy. why is there a department of energy when they produced nothing according to their mandate? we do not need to have that.

education should be a local issue. it cannot be 5000 people in the federal government. [applause] those other types of things that we have to do to get the budget on the right track. >> congressman, virginia wants to know why you feel it is necessary to be in so many wars at once. >> i have never felt it necessary to be in so many wars at once. the one thing that a soldier understands is that they took an oath to support and defend the constitution and protect people, but we would really like to stay home with our families. we would like to come home every single like to see our wife and kids. but when we are told to go and do something, we go into it. let me tell you what the important thing is to have happen.

after world war ii and korea, 75% of the men in washington, d.c., admitted to sending men and women to war. now you have less than 10%. let me send to myself. they do not have a freaking clue. [applause] i know what it means to stand over an american soldier who has been shot and make the decision to go into a combat operation. is personal to me. those to my friends. my brothers and sisters. my nephew is out there. if we could get more people on that side that understand what it means to answer that phone call at 2:00 in the morning

where you do not know if you are coming home, that is where we have to be to face that situation as far as commitment to conflict operations. >> congressman, moving on to an area regarding tax reform, can you comment? >> flat tax is basically meaning that we eliminate loopholes and subsidies when we talk about corporate business tax rates and personal income- tax rates. 13% to 16%, that is what to winnipeg for a child tax credit. corporate business aside, you have no loopholes or subsidies. talking about a consumption based attacks, that is what we had in 1916 when we created the

16th amendment. based upon what you consume. that was fine, but what you want to make sure of is that if you answer to the fair tax, all levels of federal income taxation have to begone. if you are not careful, you get what is called a value-added tax based upon consumption with national sales tax on top of that. you have got to get rid of the death tax. the estate tax. the irs, if you are going to have -- [applause] if you are going to have a fair tax. meaning you have to repeal the 16th amendment. the fair tax cannot be something that we dictate. remember, you have 47% of wage

earning households not paying anything right now. what a shock to the system it would be, a 28% national sales tax on goods and services. that is why we have a flat tax. it is a means by which, through incrementalism, which is not a bad thing, we could start to do the things moving us toward having a fair tax. >> congressman, i know that she mentioned the corporate tax rate explanation, looking further, what about lowering the corporate taxes to create an additional $100 million? >> that is what i said. i said 21%. if we keep our state tax rate experts, for operations topped out at 26%.

21% is the right place to give them a competitive tax rate with the rest of the world. we cannot lower it down to 12% like some places, but 20% is competitive. there are no loopholes. >> we want to know your opinion on the value-added tax. >> it is what is killing europe. thearen't just increasing level of taxation on people. if you do not have a fair tax, you have to eliminate other forms of federal taxation, as this tax is crushing america's households. >> kelsey from park county wants to know -- he recently voted to roll back the serious compromises on clean air.

can you promised to support clean energy and clean air? >> i believe in clean energy solutions, but to have to look at this as well, with new regulations coming down, the epa tightening regulations where you are putting americans out of work, i do not think that that is what we want to have happened. the administrators of the epa set before congressional committees. when she was asked about the economic ramifications of the programs, she said that this was not the time with a regulatory environment to kill by corporations and businesses in the united states of america. i am a masters to with diver. i want good, clean reeves with everglades. >> [inaudible]

support clean coal and nuclear power [inaudible] nuclear waste [inaudible] >> i have to tell you something, 75% of the plants that are nuclear capable, these other chlamys records you could have out there. [applause] >> tourism as the lifeblood of four of us economy, many industries are operating in and clean water. how can you be sure to protect these businesses from harmful pollution like my for gin and phosphorus? >> we will not have any kind of pollution out here, and one of the things we're doing is looking at how we can enhance energy resources from the gulf

stream. and if you take a trip down, you can see how we're looking at harnessing the energy of the ocean to power of our systems here across south florida. no one is looking at how they can pollute more. one of the critical things that will be happening soon by in 2014, the panama canal will expand. there will be more partnerships coming here. we have to look at how we can do what is necessary for those ships coming here, people doing what is necessary to protect their systems while they are seeing how they can accommodate these larger vessels. the thing is, we cannot continue down a path of sacrificing americans and jobs over these types of things that are not really proven to be so. right now our oceans in south florida are some of the cleanest around.

you can laugh about it, but i was out there and i was diving down to 120 feet. i think it is ok. [applause] >> how are you working to promote the everglades restoration project? >> it is also part of our tourism industry. i have to tell you, michele bachmann said something that was an incredible faux paw yesterday when she mentioned working -- looking for federal resources in the everglades. when i see her next week, i will straighten her out about that. [applause] >> one question here that i am not familiar with, the keystone xl pipeline. are you familiar? >> yes, it is coming out of

canada. gas oil pipeline. >> christina wants to know if you support the pipeline. >> i do. right now, when we look at -- [applause] you know, i would rather have a pipeline coming from canada to saudi arabia, venezuela -- rather have a pipeline coming from canada then prevent venezuela [applause] roxxol is looking to drill off of the international waters of key west, going at deaths deeper than what deepwater horizon did. if you understand slant drilling, understanding that you can offset it, the thing is, they are going to establish that platform in cuban waters, meaning that we can not say or

do anything about it. if there is an incident, you know where it is coming. this is where i believe, and digraph -- drafted a piece of legislation that would of prevent people from coming in from cuba to grow with the miles of our international water line. we cannot allow that to happen. >> congressman, i wanted to move on to questions regarding jobs. emanu-el asks -- what do you think is the best welcome to improve improve -- employment in florida? >> one of the things that we look at in south florida is the unemployment being at around 7%. there are three things that we have to have. i call them confidence, capital, and certainty. we have to have confidence in the tax policies and regulatory

policies coming out of washington, d.c.. because of the tax burden that these businesses have, the health care law, putting them on part-time because they cannot afford the increasing insurance policies, those are the types of things that we have to turn around. access to capital right here, we have small banks that want to lend to small businesses. the dodd-franc bill has not included many of these banks under the bill in the same way as our larger banks. coming down, telling them that they have to reclassify the loans as-assets. it is about access to capital that will help our small businesses to grow. there are too many clothes that

storefronts them here. the last ming is certainty. people just do not know what is going to happen from day to day. we can make sure that we are restoring the confidence in the small business owners so that they can grow and hire more americans, providing a certainty so that they know what will happen as far as tax rates one year from now, which is why i support a flat tax. small businesses operate as a sub-chapter corporations. we have got to provide them with certainty there, so that they know what their rates are going to be. >> if you have a question, please write it down and bring it to us. we really have to do to yourself if we have a chance. [yelling] >> the next question is from margaret of palm beach gardens. sir, if you have a question, we

would like you to write it down. that would be really helpful. congressman, you are putting in place -- what are you putting in place to help those get jobs in terms of tax cut the deduction for outsourcing? >> when you look at the problem here in the united states of america, we are outsourcing to many jobs. there was an urban legend going around that fast-food restaurants were outsourcing drive-through lanes. we do not need to do that. how do we get those jobs coming back to the united states of america? if they continue to outsource when you give a competitive tax rate, you have every right to fine them. right now, we are creating that problem. telling these corporations and businesses, pushing them away,

then finding them for having these high tax policies that are not enabling them to grow. they want to come to america and grow, we just have to set the conditions for the private sector and that is not what we are doing right now. [applause] >> charlotte from jupiter says that you were elected to bring jobs to the company -- country specifically, what jobs bills have you introduced to do that? >> house resolution 1663 says that we will extend the work office of tax credit in 2012 income 2013 for small businesses that had 100 employees or less. we will give you $6,000 in tax credit for every american the to

higher offer of the unemployment rolls. that piece of legislation is in the ways and means committee. there are nine pieces of job promoting legislation coming through the house as early as march of this year. nine pieces of legislation. that is the confounding thing about what is happening in washington, d.c.. we are doing everything that we can. i know that we have opened up a new yawling facility north of west palm beach where we are talking to the military, possibly lockheed martin, about bringing in a repair facility for combat ships in west palm beach. in the month of october we will bring the small business community down to talk to

subcontractors and about how we can alleviate the tax and regulatory burden on them. those are the things we are trying to do. >> marcia seems to be frustrated with congress. and their inability, in her opinion, to create jobs in the near and medium future. she wants to know when congress is going to get to work and focus on this job, no matter what it takes? >> you have to understand that there is an incredible ideological chasm in the united states of america. there is a group that believes the way forward regarding employment checks, that the path to prosperity for america is to set the conditions for private

sector growth so that they are the ones that create the jobs and opportunities. that is a very big chasm that is fitting bigger each and every day. if we continue to believe the best way forward for america is a bigger federal government, who pays for that sector? two to one, it is only a matter of time. centrally controlled economies have never been successful anywhere in the world. yet, remember what winston churchill said. we are trying that here. but that is the antithesis of who we are in the united states of america. we have been in existence for 235 years. one simple question. what built america?

of the government for entrepreneurial spirit? -- big hit government for entrepreneurialism spirit? -- be government-funded or -- big government or entrepreneurial spirit? [applause] >> what are the best options for protecting israel against missiles from iran? >> their best option is to take aggressive action to defend themselves. that is their right. prime minister netanyahu is responsible for the safety of those people. when you think about the rockets pouring into southern israel almost every day, the fact that hezbollah has 50,000 rockets and missiles with the capability to strike every single major city in israel from southern lebanon

and the fact that iran is developing intercontinental ballistic missiles that might have nuclear warheads and which definitely could have other types of dirty war heads, they have the responsibility to do that. i want you to do some homework. where does the word palestine come from? many people think it is associated with an individual, but it is not. it comes from a roman word, .alestinia emperor hadrian decreed that the lame -- the land would no longer be called that judaica, that it would be called pallas athena rigid palace -- palestina. the original philistines were not arabs, they were not from

that region. they were great. when you hear people talking about free palestine or returning it to the original owners, the original owners are very simple. the original owners are the jewish people. [applause] >> in this irrational emotionalism and not being a product of the media being put out there, i do not think a lot of americans, given the earthquake and what was going on with hurricane irene, it is only intensifying, ladies and gentlemen. >> beth from boca raton has some concerns about the obama

administration's position on israel and asks if there is any hope that the obama administration might reconsider their current position. >> i can tell you that that is untenable for israel. now you are talking about the modern day state of israel being only 9 miles wide, which is not feasible. when i spoke to leadership over there, there is uncertainty causing a lot of the concern. saudis are really angry at america. they saw what happened with hosni mubarak and they believe that they are on the round. there are a lot of questions out there. the most important thing that the administration has to do, they have to vote no against these unilateral declarations of the palestinian state, which sends the right message. if they do proceed forward with

it, funding needs to be cut off from the united states of america. >> the congressmen -- congressman, i think this question comes from a chef. he wants to know how the food was in israel. [laughter] >> it was too much. let me tell you, it was a very good trip. the cultural aspect, the religious aspect, every bit of it was so important. if you have never had the opportunity to travel to israel, i would recommend it. [applause] >> i want to talk about administrative issues in washington, d.c.. vincent and audrey cassidy asked -- what was the response in terms of spending more work time in washington? [applause] [applause]