wall street protests with the editor at large, jonah goldberg. and we will talk about how drugs are approved by the fda. the ceo of big pharmaceutical company based in san francisco will be our guest. ♪ host: date to of president obama's bus tour to rally support for the $447 billion jobs bill. in north carolina today and then and virginia. on capitol hill today the senate is in this week. the house is out. the treasury secretary will take questions on loan programs when he appears before the small

business committee of the senate. ben bernanke will be in boston to give a speech about the lasting impact of the economic downturn. c-span.org will carry that speech at 1:15 this afternoon. we begin this morning with your 9ake on herman cain's 9-9- economic plan. , national sales and personal flat tax, replaces corporate income and personal income tax, and eliminates itemized deduction. if we want to get your thoughts. republicans, independents, your respective phone lines. according to his campaign, the plan would have raised $2.31

trillion in 2010 with a breakdown of $862.6 billion coming from the 9% tax on corporate income. some in his own plan say that it is a nonstarter and may not bring in as much revenue as the current tax code. "usa today" says his 9-9-9 plan

does not add up. well the people would find themselves paying 9%. -- wealthy people. herman cain was on meet the press on sunday. here's what he had to say about his plans.

>> we spoke with independent analysts, we're not just reading newspaper clips. they have looked at this. it is incontrovertible. there are people who will pay more. >> that's right, but most people will pay less. >> who will pay more? >> the people who spend more money on new goods. the sales tax is on new goods. >> what is your take on the plant? -- plan? caller: the same as the experts. it would raise taxes on average, ordinary income earners and basically gives the rich a free ride. poor people subsidizing millionaires, that is crazy. host: michigan city, indiana,

ellis, a republican. good morning, you are on their air. caller: ok. yes, i feel as if -- can you here makes? -- hear me? host: you have to turn the television down. caller: never mind. host: now thomas, independent, florida. caller: i have worked in politics on a couple campaigns. it is very tough right now for me as someone who knows how the sausage is made, republicans putting policies in place that alleged to help people when we know that they brought about the

economic implosion the world is feeling now. there are ones who want to help business and i am ok with that. but the other side of the argument is republicans now say they are for people when they have brought about the biggest financial collapse or arguably the second-biggest if not the biggest in the world. it is the longest lasting financial collapse. very tough to trust them now when they want to cook up another product of something. -- pot of something. herman cain is trying to give us a simple answer to the largest, deepest, and widest economic malaise that we have seen in our country's history and it is not that easy. host: david is a republican in texas. caller: good morning.

i think he has an interesting plan and it's more or less a starting point. the discussion on sunday with david gregory was in lightning. opponents cannot seem to understand the underlying idea that there are so many hidden taxes passed through the cost of goods to everyone, and we will pay the national sales tax, but overall we will be paying a lower price of goods and services. look at the cost of telecommunications 20 years ago, a three-minute phone call from texas to georgia was probably $5. it's practically free now. there's does so much. the thing that i would like to see, whether we could someday get to a fair tax, we take

hundreds of billions of dollars to collect these taxes. making a flat tax and fare system that collects money that's lost through the underground economy and such will raise so much more money. lowering the cost of doing business will bring in so much more investment. there are so many other places that have to be taken into account that it is easy for people to say if we do this then these costs -- you will never -- congress will raise these things. the first thing they did this morning on a show they said that a flat tax was the worst idea. that was the introduction to their show and what they started talking about. they read a statement saying

it's a fair idea if it's on top of everything else already done. get rid of all they gimmicks they have in there, which are monstrous. host: here is a tweet. herman cain wrote the opposing view of the "usa today" editorial. --says this

timothy, independence, michigan. go-ahead. caller: good morning. instead of looking at herman cain'a 9-9-9 plan, why not look at the man. just because he sold pizza does not make him a genius. i would like to know what is what his educational background is. it takes a large machine industry and other support industries in the united states a long time. you cannot make these people overnight. you can drop a carpenter off at

a building site and by october you have a framing carpenters. but all the skilled people that it takes to start manufacturing is like starting up a whole new medical industry. i appreciate your taking the time for my comments. host: tom, a democrat in west virginia. caller: this 9-9-9 plan is just hilarious, crazy. first of all, maybe right now that the economy has been sinking in the last 15 years because of republican plans in the first place, we need to have some sort of mercantile tax. we have to realize what has got us to this point. herman cain has a plan out of

the republican field. this thing is none of the ones in the house or senate want to come up with another plan. we have to look at things intelligently. mitt romney and herman cain out of this republican field are the only two that have a plant and one of them is this lame. i am a common person in west virginia calling the intelligence of this laughable. why in the world is no one else in the country saying anything about this? host: ron paul unveiled his own economic plan yesterday. republican presidential candidate ron paul on monday laid out a plan that would lower corporate and individual taxes and cut federal spending by $1 trillion during his first year in office, partly by eliminating

five cabinet-level departments. host: wayne is a republican in louisiana. caller: i think it is the most ridiculous thing i've ever heard in my life. it is stupid. that will destroy the people in this country.

9-9-9 is not going to work. i am a republican. if we keep running all these crazy people in the republican party, i will have to vote democrat. i will not vote herman cain. koch brothers are backing him and he is just a ponzi for them. that's all i have to set. -- say. host: have you looked at mitt romney's plan? caller: i don't know anything about him. there are no resources up there except the only one i like was, the one used to be the speaker of the house. host: newt gingrich.

♪ calcaller: yes. host: have you been watching the debates? caller: newt gingrich is the best candidates of a whole bunch. he is the only one that makes any sense. host: there's a debate tonight in las vegas, nevada, hosted by cnn, the republicans, 8:00 p.m. eastern. here's a story by the associated press about the brothers. so that's on his long ties to the koch brothers.

karen is a democratic caller in cleveland, ohio. caller: good morning, thanks for taking my call. we are talking about herman cain. he is not going to be a candidate. right now and we are in your way -- a year away. all this extreme stuff is coming out. he really is extreme. the fact that they are even acting like they would vote for a herman cain as a republican is ridiculous. more than half the reason the obstructionism is going on is because president obama is black. that is the troops -- truth. for them to have a black candidate themselves, is all just for show, just like the situation with michael steele. there's no way they're going to

put herman cain in theire. the text of his 9-9-9 plan -- the tax code is so huge and he wants to wipe everything away, that's ridiculous. it's a lot more complicated. they will not even let them get rid of the bush tax cuts. host: on the debate tonight in nevada, here's this headline, and herman cain has the most to gain or to lose at the las vegas debate, say gop strategists. and here's a story from new hampshire.

you probably also heard yesterday that iowa had scheduled its caucus or january 3. it is up in the air as to win new hampshire will schedule its caucus. we will read more from an article on that a little later.

host: pamela, republican, schenectady, new york. caller: i don't even want to say the numbers of his plan because i have heard them too much. he said the 9% sales tax would only effective you buy new or used items. food is a new item. this will affect the lower class and middle-class more than the upper class. i have reviewed all the economic plans by mitt romney and now the one by ron paul, since to make the most sense. we need to cut government and

military spending. he has the best plans of our. host: independent line, idaho, richard. caller: i agree with the last caller. it is a matter of basic arithmetic. even if it was a viable plan, to think that someone could implement something like this without significant economic upset in the economy, honestly, i agree with two callers ago that said herman cain is not even a viable candidate. he's not going to make it. i think that's true. he may be a fantastically and may be equally good at what he does. but as far as understanding the environment we are in, he clearly does not have a plan to deal with it. host: who are your favorites? caller: white now i like mitt romney. he has been in a very complex

environment. i do have concerns with his ties to several in the financial sector, but he is the best of our. host: would you ever vote for barack obama again? caller: right now i would. as an independent i can go back and forth. i don't think barack obama has done such a bad job as people upset. if you looked at the last time we had this type of economic collapse, we have 25% unemployment. we don't give people for court here -- we don't give people credit for the fact it was only 10% unemployment. host: between mitt romney and barack obama as an independent, which way would you vote? caller: i am still favoring barack obama. host: that was richard in blackfoot, idaho. we're asking you to post your comments about herman cain's 9- 9-9 plan on facebook and

twitter. one viewer says -- now to kentucky, david, democratic caller. caller: the 9-9-9 plan puts an end to the payroll tax and that is what funds social security. social security and medicare and would automatically be stopped. in kentucky we pay 6% sales tax. that would put us at 15%. you can imagine going out to buy a car or something, what that would do. host: the call for national sales tax under his plan is not sitting well with new hampshire voters or likely not to sit well with new hampshire voters

according to this piece this morning. they say the call for national sales tax that takes away limited government that he would need to capture as defeat mitt romney. fort lauderdale, florida, john, democratic caller. caller: good morning. the last caller is right on target. it is such a joke to have a 9-9-h a ke this man 9 plan. the only people who will be paying taxes are poor people and the middle class. these are the people that buy most of the products. these are the people that

support mcdonald's, and chicken restaurants. the rich people do not patronize these kind of places. you're not going to raise taxes on rich people with this. this is a ponzi scheme. this joker. the american people, why are they so galt? pole --re's erasmus and rassmussin poll. and here's the washington post, he talks about surviving: cancer.

let's hear from michael, republican, miami, florida. caller: yes, ma'am, good morning. and thank you to the show. i am ok with 9-9-9 plan. if people are listening, he said that he is going to scrap the current tax laws and start over. and as i'm hearing it wrong. even if i am hearing it wrong, i would be happy to vote for him over all the other candidates right now because they have been in washington and what have they done?

independence, a democrat, republican, should ask themselves, do you trust the current administration and the people presenting us to the point you are willing to keep going with status quo? host: "usa today" reports --

also all, we mentioned president obama is pressing the republicans on his jobs bill. last week the senate blocked the president's $447 billion -- we will look for that debate in the senate today on c-span 2. west in it, crofton, independent caller. good morning.

-- carlton, independent caller. caller: thank goodness for c- span. it is not like the liberal media. you show both sides. i like herman cain except for one thing. and thatuse one ninc ane would be income tax. on the budget, the budget could be balanced if we do wanting -- cut all federal pay by 10% including congress and the president every month until they balance the budget. social security could be saved at by one simple paint -- cut out all the people making over

$40,000 per year, cut out all all those. social security would be saved. host: 40 on the line -- freddie online. caller: we have a constitutional republic that no one understands including the irs. someone comes up with a simple solution and that is easy to understand and they criticize his plan as being radical. we have a tax system that is radical now. host: montana, margaret, democratic caller.

caller: i am far from racist. i cried when obama came into power. herman cain's 9-9-9 plan is ridiculous. it funnels more money to the top and makes it so that the middle-class and poor people are paying more money than the rich, if they pay any. we all know they are not paying , 1500 of the richest people in this country are not paying any taxes at all. host: some other headlines for you this morning --

and then this story -- then there's this headline -- those three stores this morning for you on the health of our banks. fort wayne, missouri, independent. what are your thoughts on his economic plan? caller: i really don't king the

9-9-9 plan is a good plan. a goodon't think it's plan. things are never going to change with lobbyists, special interests, corporate america, until we get them out of our government. our government leaders bow to their master, not to the people. host: republicans in baltimore. caller: i think this 9-9-9 plan is the way to go. the problem is nobody wants to change. people talking about you are going to pay more taxes, change the tax code is what i say so that everybody can understand what they're paying and everybody pays the same king. -- same thing.

it would only be fair if we are all paying the same thing. nothing will be there unless we try to change things. people complain about the same thing all the time. we put the same people in there with the same ideas. somebody comes along with a great idea and nobody wants to change. host: richard, so falls, south dakota, richard, a democrat. caller: good morning. it's amazing that all these people complain about the rich, protesting. why don't they take the example of a great man like herman cain and actually worked for living instead of spending your money on pornography videos and gaming and gambling, cell phone, fancy

cars. 9-9-9 plan is very simple and straightforward. host: we will be talking about the occupy wall street protesters in about 15 minutes with jonah goldberg. here is a front-page story from this morning -- that's in the new york times this morning. and the washington times has a look at the fast and furious guns program, the guns that were brought into mexico. here's a cool start of those people that were accused in january, indicted of buying or aiding in the purchase of more than 840 weapons including ak-47 assault rifles. congressional investigators say the number might be as many as 2000.

also, baltimore sun, supreme court to rule on lying about honors. deciding whether freedom of speech includes lying about military honors. also, in the same paper, the government is weighing a rise in gas taxes in order to pay for -- to create jobs through a massive construction program focused on transportation and schools. that is one effort in maryland on jobs and infrastructure programs, to raise the gas tax. 15 cents in that tax samuel, a republican in texas. caller: good morning. i think a lot of people are

getting on adderall 9-9-9 plan because it is something easy to thember -- getting on to 9-9-9 plan because it is easy to remember. people are talking about that compared with 1%. something more important is 4654. 46% of americans pay no personal income tax. another 64% pay all of it. that is the real number. we are having to carry the rest of the country on our backs. i am not saying all the 99% people out there -- i think a lot of them have been handed everything in their life. i like the 9-9-9 plan because everybody starts to pay their fair share instead of one part of the country carrying arrest who is not doing anything --

carrying caressthe rest. host: this shows warren buffett would play -- pay no taxes under the plan. caller: i'm not sure how that is the case if there's a 9% personal income tax and 9% of what he makes should go to taxes. host: this is what they say. if implemented, it would eliminate taxes on capital gains, significantly reduces warren buffett's tax rate because its ordinary income outside capital gains comes to about $4.9 million.

warren buffett would likely pay virtually no income taxes under the 9-9-9 plan. caller: i think maybe we should try to get the taxes down to where everybody just has to pay 9% no matter what they contribute to charity. i think people will still give to charity. warren buffett, i believe that he is an investor. i am not an expert on the tax code and ways to get around it. for most people, i think that 9% personal income -- if anything, and the the biggest problem is the 9% sales tax. i think that is what will kill

that plant. -- plan. host: becky, independence, tennessee. -- independent line. caller: i like herman cain, but this plan will not go anywhere because it is going to put tax people -- going to tax people on their income that are on social security and they are the ones that vote. then they are going to be paying 9% sales tax on top of that. it will hit the people on social security terribly that don't pay any income tax now on their social security income. the think they should be looking at is ron paul's plan. this makes a whole lot more sense. the other thing with ron paul's

plan, to segue into the next thing is that i saw the signs from the protesters, many of the signs have been in new york and whatever say "and the wars." so he would be getting votes from them, too. i don't see herman cain's plan going anywhere. if they did away with the income tax entirely expand did a fair tax, then that would work a lot better. host: she is referring to ron paul's plan which he unveiled yesterday that includes cutting $1 trillion from the government by eliminating five departments of the program including education department, commerce, and so on. the wall street journal has that story this morning. front page of the washington post this morning --

hermans, tennessee, he cain's plan. caller: this plan was drawn up to benefit the rich. we want firefighters to fight

fires and police officers to fight crime and teachers to teach. if this plan was stupid and it was drawn up to benefit the rich, the koch brothers -- by the koch brothers. host: the christian science monitor as this article -- herman cain has refused to offer up the names of any other advisers. now, mike, republican, portsmouth. host: college park, maryland, liz, independent caller. caller: two comments. one of them about the herman cain plan and what about the

ron paul plan. he is the ceo of the pizza company, herman cain? host: he was. caller: people pay sales tax for anything new that we buy, including a pizza. if you add 9% on that, that would crush consumer spending. it would hurt the businesses that he's trying to help. also, ron paul's plan is a bad idea, to eliminate the board of public education. i think republicans will say? we are mortgaging our children's future, cutting education hurts your children's future. host: front page of the washington times --

and the first free palestinian prisoners are reaching gaza. buses carrying the release palestinian prisoners have entered the gaza strip after hamas has freed an israeli soldier held captive five years. 477 palestinian prisoners have been freed by israel and this is a lopsided swap. additional hundreds of palestinian prisoners will be released in the coming months in exchange for that one israeli soldier.

now, more on the economic plan of herman cain. caller: i want to remind americans that herman cain was a pizza chain owner. host: he was the ceo of godfather's pizza. caller: yes. the koch brothers funded him just to have a black face because they know that mitt romney and rick perry cannot beat him. 999 looks like 666 to me. host: we will talk about the occupy wall street movement coming up next with jonah goldberg. c-span was covering the protests on monday and we want to show you what some of the protesters have to say. >> i've been here 23 days.

there's been a war between the rich and poor since the country started. there's no democracy. so it class war perpetrated against the poor. i knew that the poor people were going to take our side. it is important. >> i started listening to it during the media blackout. [unintelligible] people thought it was just another protest and what are they doing? then i looked at all what was going on and realized there's

hypocrisy going on. it is something you can jump into and get engaged. i could either stay outside and follow the news or i could jump in. so that is what i have been doing. >> i hope there will be enough people who understand this. i hope they will have a conversation with their senators. we need to get rid of thought going on on wall street.

host: jonah goldberg, editor at large of national review online. recently wrote a piece about the wall street movement. it is simply one big party where the price of admission is an overwhelming sense of grievance for victimhood. guest: if you spend as much time as i do watching videos, one of the things that comes through all -- and this is something that left-wing observers have said as well, matthew called this a trick of dissent, but there's no unifying theme. these people are just picked off, some of them for legitimate readings and some of them for long standing left-wing reasons. one guy had updates sign that said "i hate stuff, too." he said he was trying to come up

with something that defies everybody's position, something everybody here can agree on. the only thing i could come up with is this. i think that summarizes it. host: there is a news column today. guest: i think eugene robinson is a wonderful man. that is a pile of nonsense. almost every single thing in

there is based on false premises and false assumptions about the narrative of what happened, what caused the financial crisis, about obama's role in supporting the bailout's. the bailout started under george bush. we will find barack obama has kept on and got more money from wall street than any politician in the last 20 years. moreover, while there were bad actors on wall street, in this narrative that it was all driven by wall street greed and high finance greed and all the rest, really does not fit with history. there were many reasons for the financial crisis and the main reason was starting in early 1990's the government encouraged giving bad mortgages to people who could not handle the financial weight of those

mortgages. over time, lending policy by government became more and more of social programs until vast amounts of that paper was being held by fannie mae, freddie mac, and the federal housing authority and all the rest and created a public housing market, created a bubble in the bad paper that then shifted into wall street. people like barney frank and chris dodd have far more to blame greedy are far more to blame than people on wall street. the simple demands for economic justice is a trajan horserace. it is a word that sounds reasonable but is in fact incredibly radical and very typical to define. out there demanding a simple phrase, but not a simple idea. the idea that economic justice is something you can demand of washington and it will deliver its deeply complicated

and carries with it's a lot of radical left wing, marxist, socialist ideas with it. if you say economic justice it sounds reasonable, but they are not be unreasonable. host: eugene robinson goes on to talk about the popularity of the movement and the politics. he says even republicans have started to talk differently about the movement. within a week of talking about -- eric cantor was backing away from earlier comments about referring to the group as a mom- and-pop -- as a mob. guest: again, this is a lot of contentiousness. the "time" magazine poll said are you really mad at wall and do you supportsupport

people protesting against wall street? the occupy wall street thing has become a representation of reasonableness. you have this pseudo event of what the occupy wall street represents the in the mass media. the reality of these people on the ground as welcome. eric cantor and many republican politicians are wise to say there are legitimate concerns out there. the 99% people who have their grievances, some of them are just whiny and have nonsense. some of them are hard-working people that have been caught in a hard economy.

it is legitimate to say we are with you for being upset about how bad the economy is. on the other hand, the reality of what the occupy wall street people are actually saying in the park and elsewhere is very different. the problem with comparing the occupy wall street guys with the tea party guys seems fairly simple. the tea party people who were patriotic, wanting limited government, believe is in the constitution, versus the open- ended, everybody is welcome as long as they are passed off movement that we have with occupy wall street is the tea party was against bailout's as well. they were against bailouts of aig and wall street and the automotive industry. the occupy wall street guys are taxpayers' dollars because they did not get their own bailout.

host: the department start out organized? did the tea party movement starts out organized? guest: it did not and it's still is not organized. to say that one thing did not start out organized and another did not start out organized does not mean they are the same thing. from anre's the story "to the national review." -- jonah goldberg's peace piece < "those dreamy anarchists." what did you mean there? guest: there is the narrative,

the democratic party, contrary to the nostalgia, was terribly hurt by the 1960's and radicalism in that time and in the 1970's. they have had to keeps wearing that there were not as radical as the students for democratic society and the black panthers or any of those kinds of. we have seen this narrative, bill clinton had this problem, barack obama had to disavow the weathermen, john kerry became famous as a protester for the vietnam war. now you have occupy wall street guys out there who are decidedly serious, at least the ones in the parks, are decidedly serious left-wing types.

all you have to do is, look around youtube for half-hour looking at their videos. these are decidedly the kinds of people that the democratic party has spent years trying to disassociate itself from to win over middle-class people and independents and all the rest. because of liberal tea party n.v. and general nostalgia in the 1960's, people are falling all over themselves to endorse this movement. communist party of america just gave a speech in chicago, talking about free expression and it is wonderful. it's going to get them into trouble. my most serious prediction is that the whole thing will fizzle out. the second is the democrats will hold thembraced this just long h to get elected. host: here's what president obama said about the occupy wall

street movement. >> what i think is that the american people understand that not everybody has been following the rules, that wall street is an example of that, that folks working hard every single day getting up and going to their job and being a loyal to their company, that it use to be the way to the american dream. that's how you got a tip the old-fashioned way. these days a lot of folks doing the right thing are not rewarded and a lot of folks doing the right -- who are not doing the right thing are rewarded. that will express itself in 2011 and beyond until people feel like we are getting back to old- fashioned american values. if you are a banker, and then you are making your money by making imprudent loans to

businesses and individuals to build plants and equipment and to hire workers that are creating goods and products that are building the economy and benefiting everybody. host: jonah goldberg, how would you characterize those comments? guest: they are wise politically. they are trying to cast themselves as a mainstream guy who shares frustrations with mainstream americans. there's a lot of troops to how the characterizes it. host: not a full embrace > guest: not a full embrace, but he's moving in that direction. he was using the phrase "the 99%" and all the rest, recently at the martin luther king memorial event. barack obama said that the same

people who supported me in 2008 are the same people who have formed the tea party now and it seems there's no popular social movement and not supporting barack obama. caller: i read your book "liberal fascism" and really liked it. i think that the party and wall streeters going to form together and go with ron paul's plan, which is in the war and in the taxes. guest: this is a long-sought dream of a certain branch of libertarian is some, that they can percept -- perfectly thread the needle between left and right and joined both sides. i would love to see that. personally i love it if they left could be coopted by the but

terry and so that all the arguments were between social conservatives and libertarians. but i just do not see that happening. inre's some nice crossovers the occupy wall street crowd in the tea party crowd, but the support, while i admit it is growing, it will eventually hit this high dogmatic wall. the end of the day, what is an admirable for the ron paul people is that they do not want a lot from government. they want the government to leave them alone. the core of the occupy wall street people is that they want government to do as much as conceivably possible for them. caller: thank you for c-span. your guest's intellectual dishonesty is really quite unbelievable. it looks like a very nice young

fellow there, but i think your intellectual capacity could be better used to discuss the wall street occupiers more honestly. i know you have but fancy rebuttal to this, but even alan greenspan and it's now -- admits now that the banks and wall street cannot self regulate. for you to start putting in language like marxist and a leninist, those people down and wall street are not about that. i do not know why -- for you to be on television like this, to cast doubt these kinds of statements, to characterize these people, it is really -- the wall street banks, they write their own legislation and deregulation and higher the lobbyists. look at phil gramm throughout

the clinton years putting through the legislation to deregulate the banks. he was a republican. the campaign contributions, the deregulation legislation, and of the wall street banks, they could be writing their own ticket in legislation. host: matt, had you taken part in these protests? caller: not yet. i work part-time. i am also stock as a result of a down economy. but it is not just about jobs. it is something larger going on in the political system. i just wish that both sides, left and right, would approach this matter and look at the problems that go on systematically more honestly. the legislation, the lobbyists, the deregulation -- taken account minds like alan

greenspan and how they deal with it. and campaign contributions. host: let us let jonah goldberg respond. guest: if you hear something that you disagree with, you should not start with the assumption that a person say quickly agrees with you but is arguing in bad faith. i have no problem with you thinking i am wrong. but the arrogance that you hear something that you disagree with and must because -- it must be because the other guy is a lying, by intellectual dishonesty -- that is your and now. i think you make some perfectly fine points. the lobbying, the incestuous between government and wall street is outrageous. what are bailouts if not incestuous? what you think about barack obama getting more money from

wall street than the republican candidate? between auto industry and this white house, it offends me. that collusion offends me under republicans as well. people look at the money goes into washington, they look at lobbying and campaign donations and all the rest, and they say what we have to have is more government regulation, more government oversight, more government control of these businesses, more government involvement. and then they are shocked when businesses give money go washington. the way you solve these problems is create a what -- a high wall of separation between business and government. you cannot simply say businesses giving money to politicians. you have to have politicians need to get out of the business of running business. until that happens, if a

corporation has as its bottom line depends entirely on what washington does rather than what the market or the consumer wants, then that change is to deal with washington rather than the consumer or the market. it is the essence of liberal mainstream politics, not necessarily marxist or leninist, although that caller is completely wrong when he says there is absolutely no marxist leninist stuff going on down there. he should read what people are actually saying and what speakers are saying when they address the crowd. they are advocating source alyssum for marxism, but regardless, get the government out of the business of running business. until you do that, it is inevitable that business will get involved in government. host: if your answer to from hearing from the protesters, we had one group involved on our

show this past saturday. go to c-span.org in our video library, you can listen to that interview. eric is an independent in sunnyvale, california. go ahead. caller: i really appreciate what the last caller had to say. the gentleman you have on right now is obviously very intelligent and well spoken, but he speaks a lot of double talk. the facts are, there may be some things that can be learned from government. i don't know marxism are leninism, but we need a national health-care policy. we need of affordable health care. i find it difficult to deal with an electronics company, he has 14 times the national wage

parity seen mobil oil making $400 million in the year that oil prices those of $100 a barrel, and you have a tipping point for an economic collapse in 2008. host: what are you calling for? caller: this is what the people are complaining about. it is lopsided. host: so economic justice. caller: is out of whack. guest: it is perfectly legitimate to say that things are out of whack. the culture of wall street and peer groupsg it to and not pay. that is nonsense. when we switched from giving ceo salaries, because everyone was offended by how high they were, to the stock option plans which blew up their compensation even more, those are all legitimate

grievances. i am not a fan of the culture of high finance and the ceo culture. but because i do not like something does not mean that i think that government meddling will pick said rather than make it worse. -- will fix it rather than make it worse. high oil prices, every few years they get really high. we have conservatives in the free market saying we need to drill for oil and get more supply, and liberals and leftists say that we cannot do that, it will be 10 years before this becomes available. 10 years of but -- opt-in years later, we are having the same argument. maybe prices would be lower. host: pittsburgh, pennsylvania. caller: mr. goldberg, i watch a lot. what if we propose to and holding tax where everyone over

$10 million, counting everything that they have including trust funds, paid 40% of it. one but it has $32 billion, bill gates -- george soros is the same. russell simmons, that is $40 million. host: let us get his take. guest: i would have to look more at the actual proposal. i do not go into discussions of tax reform. figuring out how we can slice of ever greater portions of millionaires and billionaires, the whole idea that only billionaires' and millionaires pay their fair share and all the rest, it does not hold water for me to begin with. i am not in the business of how

-- one buffett annoys me today, but i'm not looking to punish warren buffett. host: from twitter. guest: again, i think they are justifiably angry. what do you want to do with your anger? and during its own right is either good or bad. do you can kick in and or dig a well -- kick a kid in or did it well? to the extent that the occupy wall street guys are the yeoman, rugged individualist, building their own water reclamation systems, biodegradable yerts or whatever, that is great. but when they demand sweeping government intrusion into the free market and all the rest, or when they start violating

private property or exhorting violence, that is where i draw a line. host: what do you make of the "usa today" paul this morning? guest: that gets to what i was talking about. a lot of people intuitively understand -- and i think this is true of occupy wall street as much as the tea party, and you cannot talk about wall street excess in the states without talking about government. you cannot talk about government without talking about what is going on with the private sector. they are in deter -- they are interrelated and i want to pull them apart rather than push them together. caller: excuse me? host: you are on the air. what is your question or comment? caller: i respect his points but i am asking him to be open- minded on what the movement is

about or should be about. they need to take the money out of politics in general. ok? washington is basically corrupt. big money puts these people into office and they get the lobbyists and special interest groups to approve their agenda. now we have the economic collapse, ok, a lot of people lost their jobs, their 401(k)'s, their homes, and now republicans and democrats what to want -- what to do combined is say, we need to cut spending. do not cut it at a person's expense that is on disability, that gets left -- it's less than $1,000 a month with a huge medical problems. go to the people that got these bailouts, that that trillions

sitting in the bank's, offshore in the cayman islands. guest: i feel for the caller. he has reason to be met. this idea about money in politics, that the money gets into the politics because there is profit in it, and it is also because people want politicians to support their views and the rest. it is not all nefarious and evil. the idea that there are billions behind-the-scenes is one of the great mental pickups in these debates. -- mental hiccups in these debates. the other thing is if you ask 10 people what is really about, you get 11 different answers. if you ask occupy wall street,

you would get a bunch of answers that if i repeated them on there, people would say that i was slandering the occupy wall street movement. 33% at the actual wall street protests in doors of violence or something like it. -- endorse violence or something like it. they are a bunch of typical central casting campus left wingers whoever found an interesting marketing angle. a lot of people who are sympathetic with the movement, they are projecting a on the occupy wall street movement something that the people actually in the park do not believe in. they want to make it into a mainstream thing by projecting their hopes and dreams upon it, rather than looking what the actual people believe and say. host: you also wrote in your article about this movement,

many are open about what they claim to be their motivation. why? guest: democrats, eugene robinson and these guys, they had been looking at that tea party past success. a mass movement, to centralized, grass-roots movements, and yesterday koch brothers came and twirling their mustaches later and all the rest. but they have been watching all of that and nothing -- moping like a dog whose water bolas been moved. outrageous. but obama and the democrats had been hurt to some extent by the quiet of the hard left in this

country. they basically supported obama rather than playing the usual game of complaining about how liberal presidents are not liberal enough. one of the benefits is that when you are extreme fringe makes you, it makes you seem reasonable and mainstream. because they got quiet, it allowed obama to seem more left- wing than they wanted -- than is healthy for a president seeking re-election. host: here is an e-mail from a viewer. i am curious if you have gone to the source. guest: i have about five colleagues who have spent days upon days down there. i do not just watch these left- wing ones. i don't watch the ones put out by recent tv -- reason tv, but

also the ones put out on youtube as well. i like to get down there at some point. at just have not had a chance. hollen also like to see a kangaroo. i am sure that they exist in australia even though i have not seen them myself. caller: i want to confirm what you were just saying. i went to school and at this they did this -- and i decided to go by, and there are thousands and thousands of people, and nassau maybe 40 that 50 people, absolutely disheveled, and no one i would associate with. i suspect, i cannot prove it, but i suspect that this movement

is funded by left-wing and they are being supplied water and tents. it would've gone away weeks ago if they had not been supported. i cannot prove it. i agree with what you're saying is that the irony is that these movements, these people are not coming to grips with the fact that government caused a lot of these issues. if you go on youtube and look at the arguments of barney frank's about how the republicans are trying to investigate fannie mae and they are saying, no, everything is fine, and housing market is the most durable market that we have. all people have to do is go on youtube and look at the congressional debates. they are right there. if you give the baby a cookie jar, they will go in and take

the cookies. that is what the banks did. most of our problems today. guest: i basically agreed with the caller. if people want to read at the size breakdown of the narrative of where we got into the financial breakdown, peter iston from the "wall street journal," google him. host: jonah goldberg is our guest. john on independent line, go ahead. caller: i want to know, why does mr. goldberg get all of this plea on c-span? who does he know? he does not have the experience to state his opinion about nothing. he is a kid born with a silver

spoon in his mouth. host: how you know that? caller: because of his name. host: we will leave it there. ron, democratic caller, go ahead. talkingyou're really about public campaign financing when you talk about getting money out of politics. there is no other solution, making sure that people have skin in the game. host: let's take that point. guest: i am against it and not because i am outraged by it, although i am outraged by some of the things it would necessitate. i do not think it would work. before you get invoking the principle, it simply would not work. the reason why corporations get involved in politics is because washington arranges the economy in such a way to such a way that

it is in their interest. walmart had no lobbyists until congress started going after walmart. microsoft had won lobbyists until republicans and democrats started going after microsoft. now it is all due to the fact that washington got involved in their bottom line. a fantastic book that explains this in a very easy way is tim kearney's "the big rip-off." the problem with campaign finance and deliver to arias -- and the dollar torras delet -- the bad impact, it would find a way to express themselves and politics for the note -- the more you try to bring that out

of politics, the more creative they will get. all these high-29, and stealth campaigns, and all the rest. these are all the result of honest and decent people who for a mixture of principled reasons are economic self-interest felt a burning desire to express their view and politics. that is going to happen the more the government gets involved in people's lives. it's also social issues, abortion, gay issues, all the rest. the more government gets involved in people's lives, people are going to express themselves. host: new york. caller: you want to get the government out of business with too much regulation of business. you know something? if businesses were angels, they would not need regulation. nothing happened in 2009 when

the banks burst. it at least disaster and people lost jobs and massive amounts of money. " we need is more regulation. remember that triangle shirtwaist factory, it took that to bring about regulation of businesses and industry and to bring about labor laws that protected women from the kind of abuses that were suffering. host: i am going to hadd to your comments from the tweet. guest: this is a certain a lot. -- asserted a lot. i am not an anarchist libertarian. i am all for protective laws that resulted from the triangle

shirtwaist factory in all the rest. but there is a problem when you say that some is good and beneficial, therefore it all is. in 2009, the caller says, nothing happened. you had the obama administration and democrats running washington. it is not like the turnaround of bailouts. we got laws like sarbanes-oxley. >> you mean dodd-frank? >> i mean dodd-frank. one of the ironies of the occupy wall street movement is that all of these people are protesting problems that barack obama and nancy pelosi and harry reid claimed to have solved and responded to years ago. i am in favor of smart regulations. more regulations is not a solution. smart's regulations are a solution to the problems they

are a solution to. caller: alike to argue with the gentleman that this argument -- this movement has nothing to do with the left-wing movement. [unintelligible] it is very hard to take this ferry peaceful crowd as a left- wing group. that is completely wrong. guest: i am sorry that you feel that way. i think if you are completely wrong. but to the people who speak to this movement. and about leninist from new york university, you get francis fox pitt and, if you have the communist party speaking at the chicago 1, look at the oakland 1, look at what they actually say in the free library that they had, the literature that they are handing out. one of my friends was down there for days.

the vast majority of literature they are handing out is all hard-core left wing stuff. you might say that the 51% of americans that are sympathetic to the movement are all hard wind -- hard-core leftwingers. but they have legitimate grievances and gripes and all the rest. part of the problem is that this incredible double standard in the media, or the media went nuts looking for handful of racist and crazies at tea party rallies, and meanwhile the media is going crazy not covering the crazies and the anti-semites in the wall street thing. this is an example of projection. people want this to be a mass movement. they wanted to be mainstream. so they are willing to protect the planet or a search acts that are not in evidence. -- so they are able to -- so they are willing to assert acts

that are not in evidence. caller: i want to agree with mr. goldberg read the idea is to be getting the government away from regulating business. it's silly for people to think bureaucrats can distribute largess without someone being on the short end of this stick. i think most of the problem can be traced back to government. guest: thank you. a very interesting mix where republicans are coming at me like fabian socialist and the democrats are agreeing with me. caller: i am so glad that i got through because i have a lot to say. one of the first thing is that i want to say that my son got arrested in boston. i am a republican.

how was an original member of the ron paul revolution that started that tea party. they find it's so ironic that the hypocrisy is not being shown, because of the george soros, just like and jonah is saying, it is being coopted by at least one-third of them down there. the racism down there, one black woman calling the anti-semite stuff, you will not see that on the mainstream news and it goes on and on. i agree that the corruption and greed is taking over, and that is what the whole thing stems back to pre the honest, true people down there, they want to get the corruption and the corporatism and all that out of politics. host: john and kohlberg, final thoughts.

guest: i agree with a caller. i would be very frustrated down amidst all that. to try to be in again niter, not a divider, -- a uniter, not a divider, it is what you want to do with the anger. the solutions that i have seen, to the extent that there are any solution, they seem to be meticulous about having no demands. one sign saying that they want unspecified sweeping change right now. specify the change and then we can have a discussion. if all we are going to do is hold hands and sing kumbayah about how angry we are, that will achieve nothing. host: thank you for being here. coming up, we will turn our focus to the economy and talk

with richard trumka of the afl- cio. we will also talk about the drug approval process. first an update from c-span radio. >> on the day of the western republican candidate, there is a video highlighting of video. it can be formed on youtube. mitt romney's can and is hosting an anti-harry website called career politician. the only continent is a 60 sacks video. -- a 62nd. is is that nearly half of new taxes and jobs went to illegal immigrants. it is also available on youtube. as republican candidates get ready for tonight's debate, president obama continues his three-day bus talking about the jobs bill. today he has stops and north carolina and virginia.

c-span will cover those events. those are some of the latest headlines on c-span radio. >> middle and high school students, it is time to get cameras rolling for this year's studentcam video competition. make a five to eight minute video on this theme and get it to c-span by the deadline of january 20. you could win the grand prize of $5,000. for complete details, go to studentcam.org. >> because i am a businessman, of which incidentally i am very proud and was formally connected with a large company, they have attempted to picture me as an opponent of liberalism. but i was a level for many of those men heard the word, and i fault for the reforms of theodore roosevelt and woodrow wilson before another roosevelt

had adopted and distorted the word liberal. >> he was a member of the democratic party for over 20 years, switching in 1940, wendell willkie sought and won the republican nomination for president. he left his mark on political history, speaking up for civil- rights and becoming a foreign ambassador for his former opponent. wendell willkie is one of the 14 men featured in "the contenders," friday at 8:00 p.m. eastern. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we want to welcome back to our table richard trumka, the president of the afl-cio. let me begin with the occupy wall street movement. douglas stone has a piece in the "wall street journal," talking about a recent poll talking to 200 protesters. our research shows that it does not represent unemployed

america. guest: of like to see the research because i was -- i would like to see the research because i was at new york. you had people from all walks of life who were angry at what was going on. they also had a touch of sadness, quite frankly, that the system was not working for the 99% of us out there. it is working really well for the top 1% but not for them. i saw nor heard of any violence at all. these people were trying to express themselves. this is sprung up in over 1000 towns and cities across the country. u.s. retirees and active people. we figured that when this started catch on and people started coming together to say, look, wall street destroyed the

economy. they should have something to do with putting the economy back on track, because they are back to business than usual and we are left behind with unemployment. we thought they would try to marginalize them. the last visitor that you had on. host: jonah goldberg. guest: he tried his best to marginalizes prepared this party -- to marginalize this group. he admitted when the tea party started that it was funded by the koch brothers. when they allow a -- when the supreme court allowed corporate money to flood into politics, they do not think that they can express themselves. we applaud them and support them. it is a shining example of what democracy is all about. host: hit some would want to express their frustrations

through violence, what would you say to them? guest: we would condemn it and try to stop it. host: would you cut your ties with the movement that with that direction? guest: with that part of the movement. 1% of corporate americans, every day you look in the paper, and a corporate ceo foreign official gets convicted of something. should we cut our ties with corporate america because they are all criminals? no, it is a small group of people, may be a fringe group, and they may even have been sent in to foment it. we have stated in the past. -- we have seen it in the past. many people believe that this economy is now working, that we need to do better. and the republicans in

particular have stopped the government from responding to a jobs crisis in this country. host: what is afl-cio's involvement in this group for ?mar guest: we have given them water and aims, but not money. we're supporting them to get the message out. the different places that i have been, pittsburg or new york, one message is that, wall street caused this and they should invest in creating jobs. they're sitting on $2 trillion in assets, they have been parked in accounts that they are not spending to create jobs. the banks have $1.6 trillion in accounts with the federal reserve. they should be lending to small businesses to create jobs. the second thing is this

writedown of mortgages. many people are under water. if we would write them down, we would put $70 billion back into the economy that could be used for job creation. and the third one, the one they probably wall street recoils the most to and comes out the most to marginalize, a tiny financial transaction tax, 0.1% of a penny, to stop the financial speculations and go out and drop it down. people like us that have a 401(k), they're not turning their accounts and buying 50 times a day, we would not have to pay for that.

host: was cut to jobs. and thent obama o democrats have decided to pass the jobs bill in little packages. the first one would have to do with that teachers. it is about $35 billion. would you make of that strategy by the senate democrats? guest: another example of the republicans saying they will not do anything to help create jobs. think about it. george bush was president for eight years. at the end of those eight years, there were fewer jobs in this country than when he started. they are proposing to do everything that george bush did during those eight years, cut more of a budget, cut taxes for the rich, to all those things that did not create jobs, created last jobs, and so they do not have a plan predation it voted on it all together. we have a crisis in this country.

if they truly care about reducing the deficit, they should of voted for the jobs bill. putting people back to work will reduce in the deficit in the future. that is the law -- the way to get rid of it. they did not have any choice but to break it up. in each one of the pieces, the republicans have supported in the past at one time or another. i think president obama said it right, they opposed it because he proposed it. what is their plan? cut more taxes for the rich? host: what about the senate democrats that oppose the president's plan when it was up four of those in the senate? the word two of them. guest: they were wrong. host: will the afl-cio campaign against them? guest: we do not make those decisions. the people in those states,

montana and nebraska, will make that decision. it will be one of the things that is voted on. their whole record will be out there. they voted this way, this way, this way on job creation, and this way on taxes. they voted like this on a number of different issues. i'm sure that it will be major because jobs, jobs, jobs are the top three issues on everyone's mind. host: let's get the phone calls. caller: how are you? host: what is your comment for richard trumka? caller: i have seen where it is reported that the labor unions are contributed money and some of these protesters had been brought in from other areas. but i think the labor unions have a huge part in what is going on in this country and the problems we are having. to me coming unions are basically corrupt.

not the members, but those at the top. it is scary when you have such a powerful group that the president is in their pocket, and we all know that. host: let me ask you about the corruption charge for what is corrupt about the the leadership of the union? guest: they forced people to pay dues and give it to candidates that they really do not support and they are forced to do that. in some states, you can i get a job unless you are a member of the union. guest: i am tempted to say that i will pray for you. many of the overgeneralizations that you said are just that, the armed myths. i cannot believe you are blaming the working people in this country for the problems caused by corporate america or all street 3 workers did not cause the last recession, wall street

did. as far as talking about union officials, you should know this -- we are more regulated than any group out there, far more regulated than ceo's. everything we do is scrutinized by the federal government. it has been this way since 1959. i heard a ceo complaining that under sarbanes-oxley, they now have to sign a paper that would hold them responsible for the finances if they were not correct. labor leaders have had to do that since 1959. so we are far more regulated. if you look in the paper, and you will see a number of corporate officials on a daily basis that find their way on the wrong side of the law. it is a shame that you would make generalizations like that. that you would say, all labor people are bad. it is like saying all catholics

are bad or all black people are dead. those kind of generalizations are not good for this country toward democracy and do not help the debate. host: a democrat in virginia. collor ran up previous callers said that he thought that corporations are basically good and the problems were with government. have you read "retirement eist?"t tax c the author has spoken on tv in now like to know if you could invite her on and allow people to ask her questions? host: thank you for the suggestion. guest: that was a question for the network. ossian connecticut, an independent scholacaller.

caller: car really feel that organized labor has to stop working with the democratic party. work for the living wage. guest: thank you for the comment. what we're trying to do right now is make ourselves more independent, the labor movement. we have revamped our political program to do that. maebelle take 30 seconds to describe it. it used to be that we would set our political program nine months before the election. the day of the election, we dismantle it. now our program will be 12 months a year. we will keep it going so that we can transition from electorial politics to advocacy and accountability. we will not tear down, we will continue to build in between. and it will not talking to our members but all workers, getting their feedback so that we can

actually give them some voice in political action as well. we will be building our structure, and there is truth to what he said. when we build in the party structure, whether democrats or republicans or independents or anybody else, when we build that structure, we give them the power. we build our own structure and keep the power and working people's hands and it s as a counterbalance the and it acts as a counterbalance. we're determined to remain independent as much as we can. quite frankly, we would like to be able to support more republicans. but republicans do not support working people. it is more difficult. not all -- many of them. host: will the afl-cio endorsed and campaign for president obama in 2012? guest: that decision has not been made.

host: when it is generally made? host: it will be made next year. i would anticipate that we will endorse the president, but the decision has not been made yet. that will be made by our executive council. everyone gets a voice in that. host: your political action committee raised $1.8 million. guest: $1.7 million? host: according to an open secret. guest: love the name. most of our money is spent on educating our members. now more will be spent educating workers, not just union members, but workers themselves. we will do what we have to do and hopefully we will have enough resources to spread the word and get it out. host: in august, you announced

the intention to create a union- driven super pac. what is the goal behind that? guest: that allows us to speak beyond our membership. we are only allowed to use union money to talk to our own members. in many states, we talk to our members. the super pac will allow us to talk to workers in general. host: so you could do issue s. guest: not just issued adds, we can go into neighborhoods and give them information on issues that they think are of interest to them. we find out what they're concerned about and we will give them information. host: where will the money come from from the super pac?

guest: is giving contributions from members, from outside donors, it can actually be some of our pac money as well. host: how far along are you in this process? guest: it is developing. host: scott, you are next, republican. caller: i was with the union won an% until i saw you on the steps of the capital hand-in-hand with the american communist party. guest: i beg your pardon chris mark caller: on c-span, at their rally. guest: who are you talking about, sir? caller: after glenn beg, you had your rally in washington. and you had the american communist party and you're standing on the capitol steps with them hand in hand. can you explain the affiliation?

guest: i have no affiliation with the american communist party. i am a proud american and have been all my time. the american labor movement does not have any affiliation with them. yet you would like people to believe that that is what this is all about, to marginalize this occupy wall street movement and the american labor movement. look, we have more people that defended this country anticipated in the armed services than any other group out there. we do more training of veterans than anybody else out there. i'll put are bonafide spent an hour americanism against anybody. we resent the fact that the city unions are bad, you associated us with groups that are somehow less savory or unacceptable. the people in that communist party under this constitution have a right to be there. they do not represent us.

you should not indicate that they do. host: of democratic caller, south carolina. guest: you should not dismiss the communist party or socialist party so easily. you basically said there and said you are afraid to say that hand of someone who is a communist party leader. who cares? guest: i think i just said that. under this constitution, people have the right to believe what they want to believe. we fought for the right for people to stand up and say they believe in this or that. the entire spectrum is out there. the more that we encourage people to participate, the more those rights are protected. host: florida, an independent caller. caller: thank you for c-span taking my calls and the afl-cio. [unintelligible]

i do not think this country is going to go anywhere unless they bailout main street first. guest: i think what you're saying, and what you believe in, many people believe in. we have a jobs crisis in this country. wall street has been taken care of. significantly. now they're back to business as usual. main street is still 14 million jobs them. we are -- 14 million jobs down. they sit on trillions in profits that they are not investing to create jobs, and the banks said on $1.6 trillion in federal reserve accounts that they are not investing, they should be doing something about it. i think that is what this

movement is all about, saying that if you want to solve the problems of the country, put 25 million people back to work. you not have the problems of this deficit and a number of other problems. you do not have to worry about unemployment compensation because people will be giving back rather than taking. that is what they wanted to. the americans that i have been around, they want to work, if it won an opportunity to have a job to support their family. that is really what defines as, work defines the sink and nexus with one upon a -- defines us and connects us with one another. you cannot be on his show today without west virginia coal miners producing electricity to keep you on the air. he is right, we need to focus on jobs and get people back to work and everyone is better off. host: talk about the free-trade

agreements recently approved for south korea, panama, and colombia. here is what the president said over the weekend. >> this week congress passed landmark trade agreements with countries like korea and assistant for american workers that will be a big win for our economy. they will support tens of thousands of american jobs, and we will sell more fords, chevy, and chrysler's are broad. -- abroad. it is good to see congress act in a bipartisan way on something they will help create jobs at a time when millions of americans are still out of work and need them now. host: promising jobs and a big wind or americans in this free trade agreement. guest: i think is totally wrong. there were initiated by george bush. he made the caribbean agreement a little better but it is still not acceptable.

by all standards, it will cost as 159,000 jobs. 159,000 jobs. -- us one under 59,000 jobs. the colombian trade agreement will cost us jobs. last year, 51 trade unionist were assassinated in colombia, not killed, assassinated because they were trying to bring their family out of grinding poverty. they put an agreement and called the labor action plan, and since it was put into effect, 15 trade unionists have been assassinated. it will cost us jobs and it will not be good for us. i think the vast majority of americans believe that the trade

regime as we currently have that has not been good for the country. it is encouraging of soaring -- jobs to go offshore. i think the president himself when he was running looked at these agreements said that they were antiquated and do not meet the needs of the country. he was right then and is wrong now. host: you said that they are likely -- that the afl-cio is likely to endorse president obama third if you told reuters he would work against any elected leader who supports pending trade patrick -- free trade agreements. any elected leader. guest: that would be one of the of the things that will be put out there. as i told you before, there is no litmus test. there are a number of issues and this will be one of them. the jobs vote will be weighted heavily.

the trade agreements will be weighted heavily. will the president's support of those bills make it more difficult to get all of our members to come out and support him? the answer is yes, it will. that does not mean that because he has been a friend on 90 other issues that he is not a friend overall. host: north carolina, a republican. caller: thank you for accepting our calls. earlierrd you speak about blaming george bush with the jobs, half less jobs when he left office. i want you to explain why that president obama at the senate and house of representatives the first two years he was in office, and the lost more jobs than george bush did. guest: i did not hear is first and encouragement -- his first name.

caller: cecil. guest: first of all, you're an actor. the economy was losing about 750,000 jobs a month when the president came into office. george bush had last jobs at the end of his eight years than at the beginning. their reasoning things did not get done was a little thing called the filibuster. democrats never had 60 votes to overcome a filibuster, so the republican senate filibustered everything, including his appointees. he has fewer people confirmed right now than any other president before him, because the senate and these republicans will not confirm people for him. they use the filibuster to stop anything from happening. mitch mcconnell said that their number one job was to make sure that obama will does not correct -- does i get elected.

that is not the way things used to be. we need to look at this country and do what is best for the country. it did not matter whether your democratic republican, if something was going to create jobs, we ought to be behind it and supporting it. if we can people back to work, that is a good thing this country. the fact that we only make 50% of things did it for national- security because of bad policy, we should see that that is not good for the country. we ought to change that and come together. we like to work with everyone we can to put 25 million people back to work, that everyone has health care, that everyone has a decent pension when they retire if they work hard along the way. that is what people ask right now. their version of the american dream is not that everyone becomes a millionaire, but just to have a job to raise their

family on in a little bit of security when they retire, a decent pension to live on, and that they can be a short or at least believe and have the opportunity for their children to do better than they did. that has always been the american dream and we ought to work together for that. host: this tweet want to talk about the and the structure bank and the president jobs bill. guest: first of all, let's talk about infrastructure. according to the american society of civil engineers, we have a $2.20 trillion infrastructure deficit. we have not been investing in this country since the great generation. most of our bridges, highways command bases were built in the 1950's and we have been living off the gift that generation

give us. we also have a $2 trillion deficit with a new generation stuff, smart grade, and electrical distribution, high- speed rail. these are all things that would bring this into the 21st century. our competitors have this. in order for us to compete, we need to invest in infrastructure. in the past, this has always been a no-brainer, always a bipartisan issue. ever ready comes together, boom, it is out of the way. the faa, clean water act, clean air act. but all of those things were bipartisan. we need to get back to that. a big portion of the jobs bill is in infrastructure. it creates about four jobs out there. it is a multiplier of about four. it puts a lot of people back to work >> not just the

construction workers. guest: that's right. transportation worker, the person who makes the pictorial -- the material. it is a buy american provision. we have a couple of things in this country right now that really do function like an infrastructure bank. there is a one-act where we have the same kind of lending mechanism that can put people back to work. it has worked exceptionally well. it needs a buy american provision. we have gotten a fight on that. most people say it is exactly right and here's why. take the wind mill, for instance. if you by the wind mill overseas, 64 cents out of every tax $1 goes to stimulate their economy, not ours.

we should not be using american tax dollars to put their people to work when our people are out of work. we would have a buy america provision and a prevailing wage. what that means is that on any of the project in the area, the wage that prevails is the wage paid on the project, whether it is union or not. the federal government should not be used to drive down wages in the economy. that is what happens if they come in and say every job on the construction site needs to be minimum-wage. it would drive down wages and hurt the entire community. remember. our economy a 72% driven by consumer spending. consumers do not have money, they cannot spend it. host: democratic column from here, pennsylvania. caller: i have been a union

member for a long time. i was a teacher at a community college and we went union. now we wonder why not because we are all much better off because we had a union. it gives real little bit of power. whenever you have a boss, there's always a temptation for the boss to take advantage, so it was a chance for the people to make their on the positions heard, so thank you. what i am wondering today is what your position is on war in general, because i've would like to bring the troops home and end the war, but that might be an economic problem because you have more people unemployed. guest: first of all, we would like to see the troops come home and we generally oppose the war right now as it is. if people came home, i do not think it would put more people out of work.

we are spending a considerable amount on the war's end enough to judge whether or not is being well spent or not, but that money could easily be spent on job creation for those people coming back and other people back to work as well. i also want to comment about what she said about unions and how it made things better. this is the way like to explain unionism. in capsulizes a lot of it. my son was two or three years old of the time it became to me one day in my office and said he wanted to do something. i was busy with something else and i looked at him and i just said no. he was upset, but he did not have any recourse. he did not have a way to change my mind. the next day, my wife comes in

and says she wants to get a car. i can guarantee you it was a different response. we sat down and we talked about it and are actually worked through it because she and i are equal in marriage. that is what happens when you get a union. you are more like a husband and wife, equal making decisions. without a union your like a child, no recourse and no power. i think that explains things as well as we can. host: off of twitter -- guest: we are for secret ballots. i was elected by the union and came through in a secret ballot election. host: maybe he met why are you for them. guest: that is what we have done here. i guess that is what he is talking about here. host: i think he means just in

the union. guest: that is the system. the system is so antiquated and skewed against workers. really, you do not get to vote even with a secret ballot because as soon as we announce a union drive, they start threatening people come up firing people. 25,000 people get fired per year for trying to join a union. those are just the ones that get caught. host: so you need a secret ballot? guest: in some instances yes, in some know. they drag out the process for years to get tracy cabal and by then they have threatened some many people that it is nothing. there was an alternative method that said people signed a card that said, "i want to be in a union" and 51% did then there

would be a union. you go to the lions club or the catholic church. i sign a card and say i am a part of the lions club. but you do not need to vote on it. host: independence in virginia, your next for richard trumka. go ahead. i think we lost that caller. we move on to annapolis. caller: i would like to ask why so many companies have less this country. they were union companies and went abroad. the union would not agree to come to an agreement to keep the jobs here. the people leave the country, and run it themselves. they know all the jobs there. all they need is the financial backing. guest: you make interesting

points about taking over factories at the end or buying them now. it has been done a number of situations. since the year 2000, literally 54,000 factories in this country have shut down and closed their doors. the majority of them were not union but it is because the policies in this country. we were bored people for taking jobs offshore. we give them tax breaks and other things. all of these policies together needs to be holistic. the trade policies, tax policies, manufacturing policies. if we brought them all together to encourage people to build here and we would reward them for manufacturing here and producing here, the jobs would come. but what we have is a system their rewards people for going overseas. you have a corporation that has

just built a number of factories in china. we have a bill up here that would stop the chinese from illegally manipulating their currencies. those multi-national corporations that are doing business in china are lobbying against that bill because they make more money that way but for china cheating on their trade agreement. they also do not comply with child labor laws, prison labor laws, health and safety laws, and a minimum wage laws. that is another trade violation and still you have multinational corporations that lobby against any effort to stop that from happening in disadvantaging the producers here in this country. we have hundreds of small and mid-sized producers that agree with us and we come in coalition together. we think there ought to be rewards for people who produce things here.

i do like your thought about if a company just up and moves if we can take it over. in some instances you can come and in some it is not economically possible because you do not have a market to sell things with. they take the market or presume out so it is a little more difficult. we do it where feasible and we have done a number of times. we will continue to do it, but i appreciate your thought. host: 80 minutes left with richard trumka, the president of the afl-cio. caller: mr. trumka, my name is joe and i retired union minor. i would like your opinion and i would like to ask a follow-up question. are you in favor of preserving blair mountain as a state or national park that creates a preservation of the middle class? we fought a war.

i like your opinion and to ask a follow-up. guest: i would be in favor of supporting that just like i would be in favor of preserving the gettysburg battlefield or any of our other historic events. once that history is lost, is lost forever. i think that is an important part of west virginia culture. you will recall that is where the term "redneck" first originative because miners, in order to -recognize themselves wore a red neckerchiefs around their neck. that is all that it was. the answer is we need to preserve our history and heritage because it is so important to all of us. host: are you still there? caller: since blair mountain is currently scheduled for mountaintop removal mining and somewhere between 18-22 side to

reports that say blair mountain -- that mountaintop removal is a problem scientifically for america. would you be in favor of moving away from mountaintop removal and having more people and more jobs underground mining which would create more jobs and does a better job for the people of west virginia? host: richard trumka? guest: i am in favor of anything that creates jobs. we have 25 million people who are underemployed are -- or out of work. i make third-generation miner. most of my uncles, cousins, they were all or are currently coal miners, so why would be in favor of making sure that heritage could continue. host: fitzgerald, ga.,

republican. caller: thank you for c-span. i would like to ask mr. trumka what he thinks about a closed union shop. i was in the railroad industry for 40 years and i was forced to be in a union. i would like to ask mr. trump that if he agrees with that. guest: let me give you an example. what you have right now is a union comes in and there is a vote and everyone is in the shop, but not so in a right to work sates. -- states. fors say we had a vote governor and i did not like to vote and i did not have to listen to that governor. i did not have to comply with the governor or go along with anything that governor does. that is essentially what a right

to work state does. after there's a vote in the majority of people vote for a union, the majority gets to say they do care. -- they do not care. they do not want any of the responsibility. that weakens the voice against the employer and it weakens what i would call democracy. there are people who did not agree with barack obama or any governor in any state said they would not comply, then you have a weakened state, a week and the system. host: democrat from west newton, pa.. caller: richard, good morning. i am a proud retard member of the uaw. when i was still working, i was a financial officer. one thing i would like to clear up that a lot of people do not understand is in the uaw, we had

a voluntary program. that was the only money that was filtered to any politician'' campaigns. no dues dollars when there. the only money from dues that we spent for political reasons were for brochures and pamphlets and we supported different candidates. i just wondered what your thoughts were on that. guest: i appreciate bringing that up. one of the statements made earlier was it, "i belong to unions and i was forced to give money." that is another mess. the money that goes to candidates really is voluntary money, someone that has given voluntarily to a federal candidate or a state candidate. the money that we use, the dues money used for political or legislative action is with our members to educate them, mobilize them. it does not go to party

structure or anything else. i appreciate you making that comment, because i did not make that clear, shame on me. host: richard trumka, president of the afl-cio, thank you for talking with our callers. in the last hour, we will turn to the pharmaceutical industry and the fda drug approval process, but first a news update from c-span radio. >> 9:17 am eastern. the president's campaign adviser says thisaxelrod, will be rough because he came into office during economic tough times with wars in iraq and afghanistan. he went on to say that of republican leaders are extremists and the president has no choice to go outside washington with his argument. today's the second day of the

president's three day bus tour. members in show people paid more for gas and food driving wholesale prices of the most in five months. outside those volatile categories, inflation remaining modest. fears of inflation have these. the irs commissioner, in a letter to lawmakers, says proposed budget cuts would mean worst service to taxpayers and would cost the government $4 billion in lost revenue. the house appropriations committee has approved a bill that would provide $11.50 billion in fiscal year 2012 by the senate version provides a $11.70 billion, but hundreds of millions less than the agency received last year. those are some of the latest headlines on c-span radio. >> i do not object to an investigation into solyndra.

based on the evidence to date, i do not see evidence of wrongdoing, just a bad investment decision. i do not want to minimize it, but this was a bad decision made on merit. >> on friday, a house oversight investigation committee continued their probe of the energy department's loan guarantees tosolyndra, is solar panel manufacturer. watch the entire event is less testimony from solyndra officials on line in this the span video library. washington your way. middle and high school students, it is time to get those cameras rolling for the student camp competition. make a five-eight minute video on this year's theme -- the deadline is january 20th and you could win the grand prize of $5,000.

for complete details, studentcam.org. host: we are back with the ceo of a pharmaceutical company and he has invented several drugs including one for kidney cancer and one for melanoma. i want to begin with a quote you give to "forbes." what is it like to invent a drug and get it through the fda process? guest: yap understand process of getting a drug developed is highly complicated and most of the time it will not work. you can show that patients and

gives you a feeling that is like a drug and it makes you high. having seen it work successfully, you would like to do this over again. every time you do something in life, you like to think that we have learned lessons and maybe say the next time around he would like to not repeat those mistakes, learned from the lessons, and make it better. this is the story of my life that i have tried to take away from each one of these efforts to develop new drugs. each time, it gets more exciting because we now have better tools than we did 30 years ago, better science, all of the fruits of the investments made into big efforts like the genome. it is paying off today and we now have a much more rational approach to developing drugs. it removes some of the risk, but nonetheless it is still a very risky endeavor. you see patients benefiting and

getting excited about it. then you have offered them a tool to help their patients and it is very exciting. host: you say it is a difficult and complex process. how many years does it take and how much money? guest: you have to talk to run averages because of one out of eight or one in 10 drugs ago into the process eventually make it. it ranges anywhere from six- seven years up to 15 years. the money that goes into that also has a big range. most people would agree that the dollar tag is about $800 million on average. host: foreign inventor like yourself, where does that $800 million come from? guest: we have a venture-backed company and i'm sure everyone knows that in this environment,

access to capital is increasingly difficult, so with every dollar raised, we have to make sure we spend it in the most efficient way. that has a huge impact on how you organize a company, the profits come and the targets that we pick in the company to take into development. host: what costs $800 million? guest: it starts in the laboratory when you first have to decide, let's take melanoma as an example. what would be a good target? what would be a drug that could effect melanoma patients's tumors go away and shrink? there are a series of eventually working targets, and we find one that is present in

the 50% of the population and defined a mutation that leads to the activation of a new gene. this has structural consequences to the protein and we are able to apply technology we had developed in the country and we felt was a good fit. so you start with a lot of biologists, chemists, and pharmacologists, toxicologists. indeed chemists for the large portion of the program and then you need people who formulate the compound so you can actually take this into the body. so you need a field of scientists and a large group of people from very different disciplines. that is just the mechanics of it. then there are hurdles regarding the safety to develop a compound that is well tolerated with no side effects or minimal. then you have to start clinical trials and you rely on patients

participating in these trials. these are all very complex things, complying with the regulation, finding the right patients, so in this case we needed to develop a diagnostic test which we did together with a partner because this is something we had it needed to be able to do. it is really a complex effort across many years. host: when does the fda get involved and how? guest: we like to engage with the fda before we take a compound into the clinic or into a human for the first time. we make sure that the safety studies we are conducting are in line with what the fda expects us to do and we do not put anyone in harm. host: what is the fda do right and wrong in this process? guest: the process laid out

works quite well for the average drug. if you have an out liar -- an outlying drug, there could be ways to accelerate a program cost. overall, the process is made first and foremost but no one in harm's way. in this particular case, the drug we have developed together with our partners has been really a collaborative effort as data was coming out and emerging from the trial. changes were made with the fda and it produced a very good outcome because everyone was in line after realizing that the drug can be made available as quickly as possible. host: what are the faces of the fda approval process and how are

they involved in those phases? guest: starting with page-one, logically, it is a study where it typically starts with giving patients relatively low doses and increasing it. we established the drug levels that you expose patients to are safe and well tolerated. once that is established, but there is a dialogue with the fda and the move on to face two were typically we look for the activity of the drug. in melanoma, you would look for shrinking tumors. that would be a good thing. then in phase 3, the biggest study, is typically a well controlled prospective study with defined and points and statistical analyses put in place before the experiment starts to show on a statistical

basis that the drug is working but also it is big enough to make it clinically meaningful to patients. the new collect all of the data and you go to the fda with a very big file. that process can take, as i said come anywhere between five or six years and 15 years depending on how many patients need in your trial to show the benefits and how long these trials need to last to get to an end point. host: once your drug is approved, is there a patent on the drug? guest: it is very important that the patents are filed with intellectual property. host: how long are the patents typically? guest: good question. it depends on the discovery process. if it is efficient, the time

from making the discovery of a new compound and the time to approval is short. that means that reminding life on the patent will be relatively long. if there is a protracted process where it takes it out of the 20 years in pat like 15 years to do your clinical trial, you only have five years left which is not so interesting from a business perspective. as you know, once a drug becomes of a patent, they are not as attractive anymore. host: profit-wise. guest: yes, because you open the door for generics that get in and compete. host: democratic caller from fort worth, texas. you were on first. caller: the fda seems like a drug cartel and protection advocate. the reason i say this is because

the employees or the heads of the fda and major drug corporations are the same people. it is a big revolving door. comes -- someone comes up with a really innovative idea that causes the whole industry to be changed to read these existing corporations will lose billions of dollars if something you could develop turns the tables on something like cancer, whether it is treated with a very inexpensive drug. we treat cancer now with the same things that cause cancer and have been doing it for four decades. guest: i wish it would be that easy. going back to melanoma, this is a disease, metastatic melanoma, where there have been many, many hundreds of clinical trials

to date and as of this year, two medicines have been approved the really change the course of the disease. the first is an immuno-modifier and then ours. until then, there was really nothing to improve this condition. i think this is the right course to go and i do not think it is the same people at the fda or in the industry. these are actually very different people. the function that the fda plays is coming today, pretty much a function of the police to make sure we do not put anyone in harm's way. we wish there would be more of a dialogue and more collaboration's point forward to explore some of the things.

host: off of twitter -- is that ever the case? that this not aware has been the case. it depends on the safety of these drugs. i do not know the regulations for that. host: independent from west grove, pa. caller: thank you for taking my call. some years ago, i dealt with severe lyme disease. i have no insurance or money and i was finally able to get a bottle of doxycycline at a veterinarian cost. what is the difference for these

astronomical prices for humans when you can buy the exact same drug given to animals. thank god for that because i was finally able to treat my lyme. guest: it is a very, very old drug but it was not first developed in animals but humans. it to go back to the root of the problem. if there is a treatment available, generic drugs will and are being used. in cases where there is no treatment available today, and something such as melanoma, and there are several diseases where we currently cannot offer treatment. you look at the cost of developing new drugs and we need to recuperate them somehow. that explains the prizes for a time. host: what would you like to see from the government to help? is the government's responsibility to help these

businesses recoup these costs? guest: the drug industry in this country is a major driver for jobs, innovation, and for goods we are exporting. it is a dominating force. i think it is very important that we maintain that cutting edge that it is important to make these investments. i do believe in free enterprise system that is powerful. there needs to be protection in areas where it would be impossible to justify development and unfortunately, since we are now getting more educated about diseases like diabetes and melanoma, but within these groups there are

sub-categories and we are starting to understand how they work and how to target drugs specifically. that is good because we get drugs into patients that needed instead of where 60% will not have a benefit. the downside is those are smaller and smaller niche markets, to the costs have to remain high in order to develop drugs for those. the quality of the drugs are much more improved. patients do benefit from that. there needs to be changed between the industry and regulators. host: does that mean taxpayers need that money into that process? guest: not so much the tax payer money but regulation and how we lay out the rules. as you know, going into

uncharted territories, there is no amount of guidelines or map and it produces an amount of uncertainty. that in's like to have place because with uncertainty about outcomes and what we can expect from regulators in terms of approval, that greatly dictates how much we can raise money from venture capitalists or other sources that have an interest to develop drugs. the process of knowing the end game is very important and here we have some areas where we clearly need to improve upon. niche markets, especially in oncology, how much the need to show before you get an approval? we need to select patients, so you talk about personalized madison, companion diagnostics -- personalized medicine. there are a lot of moving pieces.

it is a work in progress, but there is the work that needs to be down host:. peter, you said about one in 10 fail -- one in 10 make it. you estimate the cost is $800 million to get a drug invented and across the approval finish one. -- finish line. what is typically the biggest reason why they do not make it to the end? guest: either is not safe enough or is not effective. host: this the fda make the ruling on both of those? guest: absolutely. host: what happens to the money invested? guest: it is a loss. you have to write it off. it is gone. in order to get to a late stage clinical trials, there's a lot of up-front investment.

when you look outside of oncology, there are areas where i get very concerned. in diabetes, which is clearly a growing patient population with the rules that were laid out with pre approval outcome studies that last many years, this is one of the examples where you are understanding have very few years left on a patent and it is unappealing to develop drugs in that space. it is growing and we need to rethink that. maybe we use an approach will look for a subset of patients were the risk-benefit is different so we at least can show the concept of a new drug is working before we roll it out in a big market. we start with a smaller subset. if you do not do anything about it, this area will grow into a huge burden for health care in

the long run. think about the complications that go hand-in-hand with this. host: republican from big island, hawaii. caller: aloha, peter. how are you today? i'm a ceo and we're developing a medicine that i think is complementary to melanoma. it has been shown to work for every cancer com, over 88 peer- reviewed papers. i share your frustration with the enormous difficulty in drug development. it is not like we are a large pharmaceutical company that can just dig into a bank account. i wanted to ask you two quick questions. our business model for bringing out in madison, as the fda

allows with permission -- in medicine, is to charge the patient for a part of their cost, and other part of the cash flow booking and possibly insurance companies to provide for some of the associated costs and blood work. it is a difficult area. they do not want to be involved in a clinical study, but there is a loophole there. because it costs so much for smaller companies like mine, we try to depend upon the national cancer institute and different laboratories which are a part of the national cancer institute. that particular institution of a nci has been incredibly

difficult to work with. difficult to work with.