not use their channels people to have applications that consumer and awful lot of bad bet -- bandwidths, if we are sitting in this room and there is a wife access point, i will slow down the performance that you receive in the performance of somebody in the next room over here and so forth. that is much more true than it is in the wired world. it is pretty clear to me that the wireless providers have to have some flexibility to manage their networks. the key is you do not want them to do it in a way that, in my opinion, you do not want it in a way that is discriminatory that it slows down other people's applications. it does not slow down what they have a proprietary understanding of. you need to cut the wireless

carriers a little more slack, but you also at the same time needed to be careful in doing so that they are not unfairly disadvantage in a potential competitor tors. that depends upon how competitive the market is, of course. >> unfortunately, we are out of time. that would recommend to our viewers to tucker name into a search engine. you can also go to the university of colorado website to get some background information on him. professor hatfield, thank you for being on "the communicators." i hope you can be back. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] [captioning performed by national captioning institute]

>> on newsmakers, gene sperling discusses how the obama administration wants to boost the economy and cut the deficit. >> he did not have a lot of romantic ideas about spying. he saw it for what it was. >> in the man that nobody knew, carl colby examines his life of a cia spy master, his father hiswilliam colby. >> if you watch the film closely and study him, he is a soldier. he took on the toughest and dirtiest assignments given to him by the presidents from eisenhower on wood. when they came time for the president to ask and to lie in

mislead congress, he could not do it. >> sunday night at 8:00 eastern and pacific on "q &a." >> next, grover norquist and new york times debate the tax payer protection pledge. both noted the impact on tax policy. this event is 55 minutes.

today we are here for a debate between grover norquist of the american tax reform and ross douthat of the new york times. i think tonight's event is a timely event as we hear much discussion in washington about tax policy and budget policy. i want to be clear about the fact underlying the american enterprise institute. we strive not to shave headlines but rather than to develop policy ideas to create feature headlines. this event is very timely. i do not want anyone to think we put this together in haste after all of the headlines that have been surrounding this topic. discussions for the steep -- event date back to june -- i'm sorry, rather july. prior to the deadline debate of

finality and the construction of the super committee, the failure of the super committee, and prior to senator caracoling grover norquist the 13th member of the super committee. that always confused me because of their worst 13 members, they're probably would have been a deal. i was always surprised by the comment. let me briefly set up a topic and a little bit in terms of budget and economic perspective, not a political perspective. i will introduce our two speakers and i will be on my way. just the setting of what the landscape looks like from an economic perspective, the deficit last year ran 9% of u.s. gdp or 1.3 trillion dollars. under a continuation of current policy that were to be continued, the deficit is expected to hover near 4% of gdp over the following decade as it

turns down words. things will get worse as time progresses. federal tax revenues in the last fiscal year were 15% of gdp. that is relatively low by historical record. it is scheduled to climb under current law to 21% of gdp under it -- by the year 2021. by an alternative baseline proposal described by the congressional budget office, the deficit in the next decade could easily reach 11 trillion dollars. one thing we know from budget projections is that they are highly uncertain. furthermore, failure to expand the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts would mean tax increases of four trillion dollars in the next decade. at the other 80 or so other expiring tax provisions in the tax increase would be approximately $760 billion.

looking at the long term, cbo projects that if tax revenues remain stable, if spending is not reduced, the debt to gdp ratio will explode to nearly 190% of our economy's annual production by the year 2035. the picture i in painting is about the budget, taxes, and spending. even though our discussion here today is about the tax pledge, not the deficit pledge. let me focus directly on the taxpayer pledge, and i will call up the first slide here. it this is the text of the pledge. i will not read -- i will read it, actually. i pledge to the taxpayers of still in the blank and the american people that i will oppose any efforts to increase the marginal income-tax rate for individuals and porpoises. ed, two, oppose any net

reduction or elimination of deductions and credits unless matched dollar for dollar by further reducing tax rates. this pledge was created in 1986 and it today 238 members of the house, 41 senators, and a majority of the house ways and means committee have signed the pledge. only six house republicans of not signed and six house democrats have signed it. this is a plant that has had significant influence in both the political and legislative process since it was first established in 1986. just quickly turning to the two speakers that we have, let me introduce covered norquist andross. grover founded this advocacy group in 1985. the coalition of taxpayer group opposed tire experts at the

federal, state, and levels. atr is the organizer of the taxpayer protection pledge. in addition, he is known for having a sense of humor. he placed third in the compass -- fund-raisers, the fund raiser last year. last year second? i believe that was two years ago. last year it was only third. >> i did get as high as second. >> my research indicates that next washington's funniest celebrity event is tomorrow. are you participating? >> at the improv. i will. >> there you go. ross joined "the new york times" in april of 2009 and was the editor at the atlantic as well as a blogger for th

eatlantic.com. he is the author of two books and a film critic for national review. i will say that i willross is an excellent writer. we will find out if he can make a funny joke. [laughter] here are the rules. each of our participants will be allotted five minutes to make an opening statement. after that they will be allotted five minutes to make rebuttals. that will take about 20 minutes into the game. we will turn to the q&a. there will be questions from the audience as well as questions from twitter. if you are joining us either with your blackberry here in the audience or if you are joining us on c-span and want to participate, i encourage you to submit your questions on twitter. the key thing is you need a cash tech.

-- a hashtag. that is how you can play a long at home. with that, if there are no questions for me to decide i think we will start off with grover getting the first five minutes. there is it all at or rain which mean stop stocking. we will take it from there. >> when the jets play miniature golf, do they know? --midgets play miniture golf, do they know? the tax plan protection pledge was written in 1986 and the purpose of it was to help us pass the tax reform act because people were afraid that it would become a trojan horse for tax increase. we got quite a number of

congressmen and senators to make that commitment. going into the 1986 election, we collected 100 republicans in the house and 20 in the senate that had taken the pledge. in 1988, all the candidates for president signed the pledge which is a written pledge by a candidate or elected official saying to the american people -- not to me or the americans for tax reform, that i will not raise your taxes. then they do any number of foolish things, that -- but they will not raise your taxes. bush in 1988 took the pledge part except for bob dole. bob dole won in iowa and was the likely nominee until during the new hampshire debate dupont offered him the pledge and said the rest of us up may this written commitment up to raise taxes and will you. bob dole reacted as if he was a vampire and somebody cross state -- tossed across into his lap.

it did not work well for him. bush won the primaries. bush was then losing 17 points to michael dukakis until he said "read my lips, no new taxes." that was going well until in 1990, the two sportsmen in the world told him it would be okay to raise taxes in the believe that. he raised taxes and they're away and other was quite successful presidency. he lost in 1992 because he raised taxes. there were other things going on. he he pushed iraq out of kuwait in did not get stop occupying the place for a decade. he had a very successful presidency with one hole at the bottom of the boat. then in 1994, because the republicans watched bush win by taking the pledge and lose when he broke the pledge, people realized what the power of the pledge was. the pledge allows an elected

official to credibly comment that he or she will not raise taxes. politicians going back several thousand years have been lying to people. senator warner when he was running for governor promised to but not raise taxes, except to live. as soon as he got in his crib the people of virginia with a big tax increase. warner would not sign the pledge. he always planned to fly to the people of virginia. it did not bother him and he did not flinch when he said to -- he said it. he would not sign it. asking people to sign it makes a difference. it slows them down. the other piece to that is the credibility was increased when bush took it, broken, and lost. the american voters look and said, this congressman and senator says he will not raise my taxes. he has put in writing.

the last guy who did that and broke his pledge tour -- threw away a perfectly good administration and perfectly good presidency. i think the senator or congressman or fellow who is running for congress or senate would not take the pledge of less he meant to keep it. what the pledge does because it is simple and 1 cents, and allows you to credibly commit a tourist taxes. this is had tremendous impact. starting with the 1994 election, we got within the republican party -- this is where everyone from having and as an individual commits to a party wide commitment. when people ran in 1994, we got up to the ivory -- ever so percentages of republicans running for primaries and to congress and senate took the pledge. in 1994 we elected a majority in the house that sign the pledge

and we have held that ever since with the exception of two election cycles the democrats were able to win in 2006 on issues other than supplely taxes. and allow them to take the house back in 2010. had republican sat down and cooperated with obama in having only 70% socialism on government run health care in return for putting fingerprints on a tax increase, the republicans would not have won in 2010. it makes it easier for voters to vote for an individual can it who makes the commitment. because we have all but six guys in the house, and newspaper did an interview with a asked 14 guys who had not taken the pledge, one of them said, zero. i had not signed it. there is only one who said he is

open to tax increases. freckles and is open to a tax increase. everyone else a, i have not signed the pledge. it is because of some particular reason. they have all committed to that risk taxes. he pledges help people communicate accurately to the american people on taxes and has changed the nature of the party in success of the american party. >> i was speaking very briefly at will slow down and the q&a if you cannot follow anything i said. thank you to grover for agreeing to do this. it is up to make to you today is the taxpayer protection act fails by its own. it has not proven itself an effective means of defending the long-term interest of the american tax payer. i disagree with some of the details but i think he makes an

excellent case for political effectiveness and i think it has contributed to short-term tax rates being lower than they are. it is clearly true that the growth that low tax rates encourage can enable us to low over -- roll over small deficit you to year and live with a small number of debt. at a certain point, to spend is to tax. for the last three decades, republican politicians have even added that reality. the taxpayers protection pledge has done nothing orel little to punish them for that. of which is "a couple of statistics. if you go back to the period were the plunge became basically read a passage for the republican politicians, the early 1990's. federal spending was $2 -- two

trillion dollars. in the mid-1980s the head held by the public was 1.7 trillion dollars. spending declined as a percentage of gdp during some of the years in which the colleges existed. it did set during the good luck years of the late 1990's. if your interested in -- by contrast an ever republicans have had a working majority, texas may go down but spending has gone up. by making low taxes alone, and

the litmus test for conservatism, the pledge has encouraged this climate and creates problems that are existing today appeared a government we cannot afford and a system that thinks they can have a huge entitlement system without paying for it. it has led some absorbers' -- observers, to suggest a single- minded focus on tax rates can increase government spending. and low taxes first approach allows americans to receive $1 and government services while only having to pay 60 cents for it. i do not think you have to go all the way for the it makes things worse conclusion to be skeptical of the plants. you have to recognize it has not achieved the goals the globe -- grover has set out for us. i think the same pattern shows up in the design of the tax code.

atr stands for a system admirably in my view where taxes are simpler and more visible and lower than they are today. that is one goal. leyritz has been achieved at the expense of the broader picture. between 1981 and 2010, the number of tax breaks and the polls has increased by 86%. as a result of the debate over the ethanol tax credit last year, once the distortions are in the code it is impossible to remove them in an upper downfall because that is scored as a tax increase by 80 are. i would say there are two cases, there is only one minute left so i may only get to one of them. all of these are temporary. eventually by holding the line on tax increases of any sort and effectively reprinting the republicans as the party of no taxes, the plan to help deliver

the kind of republican majority capable of cutting spending without any missing compromises. the question is when that they will actually rise. if in 2013 mitt romney succeed in passing the budget and defending it against a democratic counter attack, i will return and admit that his optimism was more founded in my pessimism or realism. i think that is relatively unlikely. even if that never arrive, the alternative is worse. you can never trust any deal the combined spending cuts and tax increases no matter how favorable it seems to conservatives. he pledges necessary to avoid the taxes rose but spending is not -- did not go down as advertised. that is a stronger argument and i will explain why i think it is mistaken in my follow-up

remarks. >> eye in used to this argument. sure, the pledge has been a difficult to raise taxes. since 1990, republicans voted for an income-tax increase, which is a good 20-year. we went from 93 with the democrats altogether raise taxes to 200916 years when the democrats altogether raised taxes without a republican vote. a 15 year. without a tax increase happening. the argument that the tax pledge does not solve the world's problems and does not solve the spending problem is an

interesting one. without the pledge and without the commitment not to raise taxes, it could never have a conversation about spending restraint. as long as taxes are on the table even a little bit, the democrats look at the tax possibility. you see this again in 1982. a dollar for a tax increase, $3 in spending restraints. taxes are raised and not only does spending not go down by $3 or whatever, it went up instead of down. the spending cuts disappeared. all that was left was taxes. in 1990, bush was a cheaper date. spending went up and not down as a result of that. tax increases are what elected officials do. that is what they do rather than covered. rather than make decisions. it is clear when you look at the state level. when you look at the plant in

california. the reason why the governor cannot raise taxes and turned california directly into greece is because we have all of the republicans who have taken the pledge. the reason they were able to close a $3 billion overspending problem in paths would -- pennsylvania is because governor corbett. we dropped spending $3 billion. michigan and wisconsin, texas under rick perry by $16 billion over two years. florida $3 billion. the pledge takers at the state level have done an incredibly good job at taking the pledge and bring spending down in a year that should have been the year of tax increases because of the end of the stimulus spending. the money the basic lesseps the rest state and local government, it ended this last year.

he did see tax increases and maryland, connecticut, and illinois. the argument that it does not reduce spending completely, it gets you into a conversation of spending and helped us with the tea party movement to do that. i would argue this puts the republican party within striking distance of getting exactly the type of control you need. the republican party were run the house for the next decade because of their no tax increase position and because they got themselves elected. because the taxes to help us elect or they do their redistricting. i recommend barney frank as exhibit a. he would not walk away from power. he is walking away from tenures in the minority. that is why he is leaving. we have the republican party to

newsprint in the senate 23 these are up. massachusetts i think he will still one. we will have a republican majority. if you look at 2014, half of the gis are and republicans states. all the are and aren't the -- have of your business. now we play for the presidency. the republican president who commits to not raise taxes has a shot of winning. the republican party that says, we might raise taxes and we might not has no way of communicating to the independent and non-aligned voters. democrats will vote against the republican candidates. talking about speaking to the non a lot of voters, that is where the credibility of the pledge comes in.

by any effort to water it down, what if we made this teeny exception here or there. what if we were the party that would mostly that razor taxes? he might be able to sell that from somebody from kansas to have been voted for republicans for generations. both in terms of building a position where it can govern and making it capable of governing, it has played a useful role for us. >> trustee finish where i've left off, i think the points that he raises are clearly cautionary tales for conservatives. it is also the case that there has never been a successful fiscal conservative -- consolidation. exactly that template has been the model for most of the successful physical

consolidations in the western world over 20 were 30 years. according to 85 and kevin have said, the most successful fiscal -- the one who took intended to keep countries out of death spirals and so on averaged 85% spending cuts to 15% tax increases. to me that sounds like a victory. to corporate probably sounds like a cell out. i think it is worth considering that if european and canadian conservatives -- let me repeat that -- if european and canadian conservatives can hold their liberal counterparts to those kind of bargains, are we really supposed to believe that american conservatives are incapable of making a successful deal? it seems very unlikely to me.

in the end for excellent conservative reasons tends to be biased toward compromise, conciliation, and bargains that advance things slowly rather than achieving things that sweepingly all at once. again as i said, depending on the scenario that grover spins out, it is very appealing to a lot of republicans. i think there is a very good reason to think the republican position in 2013 will be stronger than the republican position in 2011. it is possible that is reason enough to reject some of the dealmaking that was floated bonds by the super committee and previously by speaker john boehner and president obama. the idea that the republicans will achieve a level of power and prominence of power that

will enable them to achieve a durable 100-0 ratio in dealing with pretty extraordinary physical challenges in this country i think is extremely politically unlikely. i came of age politically in the mid-1990s. i realize that was a republican in 1996 when i realize i was supporting bob dole. i realized i might have to bite the bullet and it supports the republicans. we all heard similar promises. we heard similar promises from the man sharing the stage with me today. i do not think it is atrs fault. it is a vast and complicated system. the collapse of the majority in 2006 and 2008 was not because the party had fell to rest taxes in that. it had other causes and other consequences. but for all you can not as a policy maker expect to achieve a

durable political settlement in which you never cut deals with the opposition party. if you take that attitude, you risk ending up with situations where the opposition party takes power and you get much worse deals than you otherwise would have achieved. the risk for opponents of tax increases right now is that we have all kinds of tax increases at the federal level to scuttle to go into the fact. it is possible that mitt romney will be president of the united states in 2013, but it is also possible that barack obama will be possible -- will be president. the goal of conservative public policy is not merely designing pledges the stand the best chance of helping republicans win the next election. is achieving the best interest of the american taxpayer in periods where democrats are in power as well as republicans and in times of crisis and economic opportunity.

i think i would also -- grover dramatically over estimates the single issue impact of the tax pledge on the american elections. whether it was bush's 1992 world, and 2008 -- the democrats lost it in 2010. there were a host of factors at work. if you look at what independent port -- voters looked think about tax increases. here are real political dangers for the republican party as being perceived as a party that will never compromise on any tax increase. you can see this in the debate on the debt ceiling limit or the poll numbers went down but poll numbers went down even more. i think that knowledge explains why in the super committee negotiations they made an offer to the democrats that violated the taxpayer protection pledge.

it improve the republican bargaining position. there you have it. >> thank you both. we have now heard from both sides, eloquently i think. we are ready to turn to the audience participation part of the evening. >> that sounds terrifying. >> we will have written questions that carts are being held up. if you want to ask a question, raise your hand. those cards are coming in around. we will collect them back and i will read them as well as on twitter and again, the hash teddy his #ae debate. let me throw out a couple of

short philosophical questions. a couple of thoughts occurred to me as i was listening. i will be glad to let ross respond. grover, knowing now what you know purses' where in the world was in 1985 and how this process has the ball, would you have changed the wording at all of the pledge? it strikes me as a little bit narrow. i would talk about all taxes. what's the pledge at the state level is no income tax. . it has not actually been a challenge there. what i was trying to get that was the concern that rates focusing on income taxes could raise taxes by increasing rates or by broadening the base. in 1982, that was the tax

increase that reagan got suckered into. it was very damaging to the economy and it broaden the base and made the 1986 tax reform so much worse off. imagine how much better tax reform we could have gotten in 1986 if we had not given away tens of billions of dollars. it also protects -- it makes it possible to have tax reform. if you give away deductions and credits and then you get back to tax reform, you have nothing to reform it is the tax pledge, it is the best defense against spending increases. we know every time we raise taxes to spend every dollar. the idea that we will not spend

the money is a unicorn. >> the me ask you one other thought and that we'll to you. he referenced efforts and western europe and the conservatives and other parts of the world. is the plunge going global? is there any effort or consideration? >> you for is a lot of your remarks not between conservatives and liberals but between democrats and republicans. does that affect it to be utilized more broadly? >> two things. i put the pledge for work for anyone to use. i am happy when democrats make the commitment. if the democrat party was the party that will not raise your taxes, i would be working with them. it is not a partisan thing, is just one party wants to raise taxes and the other was to go in another direction. you cannot have compromise.

we passed -- we, the republicans in the house passed the ryan budget that cut six trillion dollars over the next decade. this summer the republicans agreed with obama to cut 2.5 trillion dollars. that was a compromise. we got the 2.5 trillion dollars we wanted. we had already taken tax increases completely off the table what happened? 2.5 trillion dollars in spending restraint. we have some examples. this is not theory. we know what happens. with tax increases on the table, they increase spending. you take them off the table, 2.5 trillion dollars in spending restraint and we wrestled a powerful president to the ground. the entire idea of the partisan thing, i should say conservative and free market, during the lifetime of ronald reagan we moved away from a situation

where being a republican just told somebody was born north of the new mason-dixon line. every fight in the old days was bipartisan. in the 1950's and 1950's and 1970's, the liberal republicans of friday conservative republicans. everything was a compromise. the compromise between a lot and a real lot. now we have two parties that ron reagan help sort out. if you are for limited government you are of a republican and if you are not you are a democrat. there are almost no republicans that will for tax increases. the two parties are going in opposite directions. if somebody wants to go east or west, what is the compromise? there is no compromise. if you want smaller government and the one larger government,

what is the compromise text somebody wins and somebody loses. this fight we are in the middle of, because they help to their no increase position, we won and they lost. or you paying attention in 1982 and 1990 when you cut your head handed to you and 2011 with a low tax limited spending people want. what is the difference? we took tax increases off of the table. >> one point i would make is that it is important to remember the historical context in which the plot was created. i think that historical context made a stronger case than what we are living in today. i agree with the description of partisan politics at that point. i think that the transformation of american politics that he describes as overall and a

victory for conservatives. there is a nagging problem of the fact that conservatives keep cutting taxes without cutting spending. that nagging problem has blown up into a world historical challenge facing the united states over the next 15 or 20 years. i think it is telling in this regard that grover started out doing battle with -- he started out doing battle with real rockefeller republicans. liberal republicans who were in the republican party but would be in the democratic party to date. in those fights and in that fiscal context, he was right. he drew a lot of important lines in the sign -- sand. i think it is telling that he has moved from having those kinds of fights to having fights where he is accusing tom coburn and pat to me who are

not javits, not liberals or moderates by any standard. that shift tells us something about the larger shift in american politics and the fact that people like coburn and it to me are responding to the reality of 25 or 30 years with a tax first spending second republican approach to politics. i think it has not caught up. >> i did have handouts here that i want to make sure everybody gets. we cannot go through everything. it walks to the tom coburn, and how we had to work with republican leadership and conservatives to get them surrounded and the feet efforts to go for a tax increase when we could have had a vote to get rid of the ethanol mandate that tom coburn supports.

the idea that he is a free market guy, a critic of the ethanol mandate is not true. he went on the floor and said i am for the mandate. nothing will change. we had to walk through all of this because he was trying to get the republicans to vote for a tax increase because the actual agenda was a two trillion dollar tax increase which is what tom coburn temporarily endorse. the guys in the house had to walk him back out of that and be him on the subject. we go through the entire drama there. it is unfortunate, but he is not being in a -- he is not being a conservative in that standpoint. >> since he is not here to defend himself, we will stop there. >> no, i am quoting it. >> we will turn to a few questions. i have a stack of questions that came from the audience. i want to thank you for those.

keep writing and twittering. let me pull two together. these are both to grover but i want to give it ross a chance to comment. you frequently claimed the pledges not between you and the legislators but between the voters and legislators. on issues like applying sales taxes to online retailers, you and atr get to decide what is and what is not tax increase. does that not mean the pledge is actually to you and not to the voters? >> know. this usually is not a challenge. very few times people wonder -- i wonder if it changes as a tax increase. the pledges made by an elected official to the voter. those of you who live in washington, d.c. have seen the thing put out by shopping bonus.

i think people arguing that the $23 billion tax increase are the advocates of the bill. i do not have to step in to have a conversation about that. the advocates of taxing internet sales say it is a $23 billion tax increase. i presume they have done the math. >> i agree. >> that is good. "he buys the stuff on amazon. >> as too high. "there are a constant -- couple of definitions on the clutch. have you ever thought of it no increase in debt plan for balancing the budget is equally as important? but me add my own to that question. any thought more broadly to the concept of pledges beyond the scope of taxes. there are a few others out there. everybody have a pledge? >> this is a very interesting

question. we started the pledge as a way to get tax reform passed. a way for candidates to inform their position with voters credibly. this helps to elect entire legislative bodies across the country. it has been very helpful in 1994 when it was a major issue and in 2010. the pledge has been very powerful. then people said, tax pledge, great. what about spending cuts, right? my answer is, fine. write it. do not spend more than 1.2 trillion dollars -- except with inflation and growth of the economy. i am not opposed to a spending plan. congress is set up for everybody touches the ball but nobody touches at last in the spending goes to this committee. most will say i voted for most of the spending, but the kind of

did accept the bill passed. the way it is designed almost on purpose to make it of pop -- purpose to find out who is responsible for the spending. i think rather than a pledge we need to terminate membership on the appropriations committee. if you are an appropriate for six years and no more than somebody who comes to washington, d.c. and they take the r off of their jersey and put an a on the jersey and cease to become part of the conservative party, it is a dangerous thing. if you are only there for six years i do not think it is as fairly corrupting. >> could you crafted the words for in a spending increase pledge? >> i think the overall. is true.

atr has tried to do this with amendments on the state level. you can come up with ways. it is absolutely much trickier than the beautiful simplicity of the taxpayers protection plan spread i am not persuaded that simplicity has actually lead to real taxpayer protection over the life of the united states fiscal picture. i would add that the effectiveness of the plant's overall depends on the political context. at the state level, you have a balanced budget amendments which places an actual -- it creates a further constraint. in states dominated by the republican party, i think the combination of balance budget amendments has been wonderful for the cause of small

government. in states where the republican party does not dominate and shows few signs of dominating in the future like california, you could argue that the taxpayer protection pledge has prevented california from going the way of greece. many people who live and work in california feels they are heading that way regardless. i suppose the big difference in opinion is, i think that an enormous enough gap between outlays and revenues becomes more dangerous in the long run than a modest tax increase. i think based on his view of american politics, grover disagrees. that is to say i think california today is in a more dire position than the united states was in the clinton era when tax rates were higher than they are today. that is the core of my skepticism about the

effectiveness of the pledge. >> we have time -- the answer is to remain sure, but we have time for a couple more questions. this comes from the audience. >> if they have already expired and then or if they vote for them before they expire? >> we have that -- >> the answer is if he went to the american people and let me tell you what i am voting on and what is about to happen, if they said you are raising my taxes then the answer is you have a problem.

i got in trouble with "the washington post" having this conversation. i am not getting into hypothetical. the answer is if you say this is what we are doing and they think it is a tax increase, you have a problem. i cannot get you out of trouble. you need to take a look at what common sense tells people. >> let's put aside the idea of imaginary spending cuts. if there was a real package of spending cuts -- a real unicorn? good. this is the 73rd time i have heard this argument but i am listing with bated breath. >> for the audits i will finish. if there was a real spending cuts, the ratio of 100-1, is

that not better than nothing? >> i prefer purple unicorns to gold unicorns. this is about the whole thing -- the democrats told him that they met with him at night. they said that is intriguing. the next night they laughed at him and told him, no way. i ran into senator kerry in the hospital. he wanted us to help us work on that. is that all we need is one trillion dollars in higher taxes. this right stuff is not going anywhere. all of the fantasy, the democrats were not part of. it was not uncool, but when you are off by yourself imagining what unicorns might look like but the democrats will not let you have a unicorn and old, is

at the white house running a campaign of class hatred and envy and greed as his campaign slogan, he would not be cutting marginal tax rates at 28%. these hypothetical questions or they would agree to close -- so for some deal with that of the cool, i suppose that would be really cool. if we come back to planet earth, that is not an option. >> does that not just leave us into a pit of existential despair? then the salvation of american fiscal policy requires us to imagine the democratic party largely disappearing at the force of national life. alternatively, the republicans passing sweeping legislation that i am monocle skeptical about its popularity and enforcing it. i would ask in part, if the

spending cuts are a unicorn when there is bipartisan support for them, why are they real when there is partisan support for that. i don't mean to i don'tron paul, but why do you think that is real? if introducing the virus of a tiny tax increase corp's the host of projected spending cuts, why do these spending cuts have it when there is not a tax increase? >> when you put a tax increase on the table and talk about spending cuts, the spending cuts could taken back. if you have a 100-1 ratio, when you look at simpson bowles and the bill turns down, the tax increase gross and the spending cuts become for their way. but a single democrat has endorsed it. the president introduced his bill a couple of weeks after and none of it was in it. the idea that the president is

anxious to sign it or is open to any of that stuff is counterfactual. if harry reid -- if harry reid were harry byrd would be somewhere. if harry reid got together with the democrats and it passed a bill that did all the things people like to imagine the modern democratic party is capable of, then we would have something to look at. bring me a bill. passed something that looks like the rhine budget. it is a real budget that can be looked at. they have not even passed a budget out of the senate in three years. they cannot say in front of the american people and with the last attack -- test and the -- when the election.

this is not easy. this is a lot of work. this has taken many years, in fact decades. the modern republican party on the started in the right direction a while ago. we started with goldwater who was against cutting taxes. we had republicans spending the money with bush 41 and nixon and ford. it took the tea party to what the party on the side of the head and move it more seriously for spending restraint. this is a lot of work and there are a lot of elections to be one. imagine a reasonable democratic party that will help reduce spending. all the spending we have now, these guys did. they are proud of it. it was on purpose. you say the pledge -- a lot of the spending republicans did, too. >> bush allowed spending to drift up. i wish she had not. it was a mistake. >> to look at the jump in spending which saw from 2007 and

ran away with things in the last five years, that is where the huge jump and the spending projections for -- it has gone on under both parties. >> there is a difference in the magnitude of the spending that is rather dramatic. what happened was, which lost the election in 2006 and 2008 on issues other than economic issues and ended up paying the price with the guys we elected. >> we are at our hour mark. a couple of housekeeping matters. i will have to bring up the last hour. slipe. faults can watch this debate in the reply of this debate as well as other debates we have had in this series previously as well as future debates. they are available act www.aei.org.

in addition, and e-book is available of the first debates we had over the proper scope of government we have had. that is available on line as well. all of that information is on the screen. i want to offer two thank you is. i want to thank grover and ross for participating. i want to thank everyone at the audience and c-span for attending tonight. thank you very much. [applause] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> every weekend on american history tv, the people and

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