tv Capitol Hill Hearings CSPAN December 23, 2011 6:00am-7:00am EST
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>> i'm sure you've done market research about your special responsibilities that helps you sell your product. is there any information if that makes a difference? does your communication about your responsibilities make a difference? >> when you come to bend and jerry's and the takeover as the ceo, you look at this than you spend your whole life in marketing and what products are
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a benefit and advertising is about getting one thing across. you meet up with these guys and they say what we found is that the more we did what we believe and the more we focus on doing what we thought was the right thing, the more ice cream we sold. that is still very much of the fundamental belief. we do market research like product tasting and the people understand what we try to say but we don't do market research to decide what we want to do. what we wanted to is led by our mission statement. it is led by what we believe is the right thing to do. through that we create a much stronger relationship and not such a big group but the group that believe in what we believe in, they stay loyal for life. on a global scale, we are now in 34 countries.
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i talked little bit about the social media revolution happening out there. that is the beauty of it, merging together. we have fans and our facebook page and they communicate all over the world. the robotic cares what is going on. this is a big thing. the u.s. economy and the u.s. way of life and the u.s. idea is a big deals a pretty r s -- so people are pretty engaged. >> from the board of directors perspective -- we issued our support in solidarity letter with the occupiers without any market research at all because our hearts felt it was the right thing to do. it was not done in secret or without management support. we totally wanted to do this.
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they helped make the letter better. it was supported by the whole organization. we did not go out to see if it would sell any more ice cream at all. we felt was the right thing to do and that is the best market research we have ever found. do something you believe in and it is usually a good thing. >> have you had a lot of blow back from your fellow corporate [inaudible] >> it is clear it is a very,
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very uncomfortable situation. we are always operating in this very structured and organized and logical environment. i have had many business leaders ask why, why are you involved with this. once they can give me 30 seconds to explain why, i have not had many people who of walked away not thinking about it. i am lucky i know a lot of people and they feel strongly about it as leaders. i think most companies do not want to get engaged with movements. they don't want to get involved with politics. we don't turn it politics. we think it has to do with the society in which we operate and hence we have a responsibility
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to participate. there has been a definite plan comfortableness in the corporate world. uncomfortableness in the corporate world. >> [inaudible] have you had a chance to speak with him about this? think any of us have spoken with john mackey. we don't normally talk to him. [laughter] >> i have not had the joy of sitting down with john mackey. that would be great.
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who bring thep companies together around issues. we are really pushing everybody around us to join and get your head around this. this is not just about the physical of -- occupation of the park. this will have an impact on your business and you better get your head around this. >> actually, you have more support when you have most millionaires want to create a better economic climate. how can what you are doing impact the political leadership
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which seems to be at a stalemate? >> i will get up and try to answer the question. if you look at the history of social movements, things take time. ben alluded to that in the three steps of philosophy. i have been to hang attention: it took women to get the right to the in this country from their first occupation in seneca falls, new york. it took over 80 years. only one person at the original meeting was alive when women got the right to vote in our country. you have to start somewhere. ben called this the beginning of the beginning and i think
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that is where we are at in this country. it is doing more and more all the time as a company and we hope others will join us as we move forward. that is how the whole thing will take off and grow and hopefully all of us will be alive when there is more economic equality in this country. >> you have four minutes. >> [inaudible] [inaudible]
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i will leave that to my colleagues. the first part -- are we going to sell the 99% movement the same way we sell ice-cream -- that is exactly my hope. i thank what the movement needs is for ben and jerry's to get that message, the message of the 99% movement, out into bubble rest of the country -- out into the rest of the country and all the sympathizers and supporters that will never be near an occupation or never going to participate in activist type activities. i do believe there are millions
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of people in the united states that support the occupied movement. we need to find a way to involve those people. that is what i hope we will do. >> i will try to respond to the second part of your question. i think it is the job of everybody here to make sure we are held accountable and transparent. that is a good function. we have had what we call a social audit where we bring in outside people to hold our feet to the fire and make sure what we are saying is what we are doing. i think that is an important thing and it goes back to the tip of the iceberg. it could be getting corporate personhood out and hauled in
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corporations accountable. it is an important thing and we try to do this with our social order and we encourage you guys to hassle us like crazy, thanks. >> thank you very much. that concludes the program. is there ice-cream? yes. there was a rumor -- would you guys cater ice cream? >> we were trying to have by screen. >> thank you very much for your contribution today. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011]
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>> have you tried the free cspan radio app? >> fans say it is visually appealing and clear. it is an insanely great deal considering it is free. it took me about 10 seconds to learn how to use it. >> anytime, anywhere, get streaming audio cspan radio and all three c-span television networks including live coverage of the house. find out more at c- span.org/radioapp. >> house republican leaders agreed to the senate but version of the barrel tax cut and republicans and democrats will meet in the new year for a joint house/senate conference committee to negotiate a full-
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year extension later this hour, house speaker john boehner and we will get an update on the payroll tax cut deal on this morning's "washington journal." first, mr. romney is on a bus tour in new hampshire. he held a town hall meeting yesterday. he received the endorsement of one of new hampshire's state senate tors. we need a physically conservative governor to get this country back on track. >> my decision is way down the person that is best suited to beat barack obama and when the general election. that person in my estimation undoubtedly is governor mitt romney. it is certainly my pleasure, a young guy from new hampshire, to be here today to give you -- introduce you to the next president of united states,
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i speak quickly and i speak clearly. it will be worse this morning. when i got on the bus, my dear what was kind enough to ask if i like some cereal and i picked frosted flakes. would you like some test? i put on a on it. would you like something to drink, i used stockmill. i'm kind of fly and sugar this morning. that may speed things up a bit. i fell in love with the young lady would i was in high school. that is kind of unusual. she was 15 at the time. i looked across this room were in at a friend's house and i saw her and gave her a ride home and we have been going steady ever since. i want her to say hi this morning, my sweetheart of 42 years, ann romney. >> good morning. unbelievable, he looks great. i want to look that good at 93
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and want to be around at 93. thank you all for coming. this is early and it is christmas of this is great that you're willing to come out and meet us and say hello. i am here because, well, did i have a choice today? i am on the bus. wherever the bus goes, i go. it is great to be here. the fact that i have known mitt this long, we were high-school sweethearts, we fell in love when we were young, and the fact that i have seen him in all situations has given me the best lens for all of you to understand something you might not seek in debates or anything else and that is the character of the man. by so appreciate the fact that he has been a wonderful husband and wonderful father to my five sons. we have the great blessings of
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having 16 grandchildren. if you could just skip having kids and have grandkids, i would recommend a but i don't know if that is possible. it is really great. i am so grateful for mitt. there are stories of like to tell what i will not sell about in standing by me in my darkest hours when i was diagnosed with multiple error -- multiple sclerosis. we have a real partnership then we are in this together. i was the one that actually gave him a lot of encouragement to think about running a second time. some of you might recognize is a difficult thing we are going through now. it is hard to run for president of the united states. having done the last time, i knew that i never want to do it again. i felt that way pretty strongly after the last time. this time seeing what's happening with the country, i was the first one to say i'm
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thank you, senator. i appreciate that endorsement. it has been a long time coming and it is coming at just the right time. counselor burton, he told me when the time comes he will take me to the north country. we have done this twice already. we will keep on the trial today and we appreciate your help through the process. isn't that something to have the famous governor sununu on my team. he makes things happen -- he makes things happen. i appreciate each of their support. i will speak clearly this morning. this young man is 93. he said he did not bring his hearing aid. he needs to be close to the speaker. i will speak clearly. my problem is i also speak quickly. i speak fast. people think i speak too fast. it will be worse this morning. when i got on the boss might find a wife was kind enough to ask if i needed cereal. would you like some toast and i put honey on it. would you like something to drink and i used chocolate milk. i am kind of high on sugar this morning. that may speed things up a bit. i fell in love with a young woman when i was in high school. that is kind of unusual. she was 15 at the time. when i looked across this room we were in at a friend's house and i saw her and give her a ride home and we have been going steady ever since. i want her to say hello this morning. my sweetheart of 42 years, ann romney. [applause] >> good morning. he looks great. i want to look that good at 93. i want to be around at 93. thank you for coming, this is early and it is christmas. it is great you are willing to come out and beat us and say hello.
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we appreciate that. -- come here meet us. we appreciate that. wherever the bus goes, i go. it is great to be here. the fact i have known mitt this long. we were high school sweethearts and we fell in love when we were young. i have seen him in all situations, and that has really given me the best plans for all of you to understand something you might not see in debates or anything else. that is the character of the man. i appreciate the fact that he has been a wonderful husband and family -- wonderful husband and father to my children. we have had great blessings of having 16 grandchildren. if you could skip having kids and just a grand kids, i would recommend it. i do not know if that is possible, but it is great. some of the stories i would like to tell but i will not in detail is how he stood by me in my darkest hours when i was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and how i can depend on him. he will always be there for me. we have a real partnership and we are in this together. i was the one who actually gave him a lot of encouragement to think about running a second time. some of you might recognize it is a difficult thing we are going through right now. it is hard to run for the president of the united states. i knew one thing for sure, i never wanted to do it again. i felt that way pretty strongly after the last time. so strongly i had a recorded. however, at this time seeing what is going on with the country, i was the first want to say that i was sorry about saying that. he reminded me that i said that after each pregnancy and he did not pay much attention to it. i think it is important that he run. it is not that there aren't other good people out there. it is that i know the skills that he has is unusual.
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he has done things in private business and government and the olympics. if you combine all of those things and they have all been a turnaround situation. if there is an emergency or you need something fact, i know who to turn to. i appreciate you being here. maybe you can ask mitt romney some tough questions. >> thank you, sweetheart. [applause] the senator said it well. we are at a juncture in america's history right now as to what kind of nation we will be. we have been going down a road of larger government, a more troubled economy, unclear to why it is in many people's minds that the recession has dragged on and on. we are now 25 million people in this country that are out of work or just stopped looking for work or can only find part-time work. we have a number of college folks here today that will be coming out of college or ph.d. programs and hope to be able to find a job and wonder if they will be able to do so. that was not a question for 10 years ago. you came out of college with a degree and you knew you would have a job. it is very different today. people wonder why that is. i happen to believe it is because over the past several years and during the period of his president, we have taken a course that has made america weaker economically. made it harder to create jobs and for enterprises to grow and thrive. we have a young entrepreneur a couple here. well, i say young -- to me you are young. they have opened a substantial business and taking a rest. there are fewer people willing to do that today. we have insisted on the government that tries to guide the private sector like it is trying to guide our lives. i think you see a president who believes we should be more like you're up with an entitlement
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society. a society where government takes from some and give to others interest to make everybody the same. the only people who do well and that kind of society are the people who work for government. that is welfare society and in tadema's society is something that is growing in this country and making us more like europe and less like america. i believe in something of mccollum opportunity society where people based upon their education and their hard work and their risk-taking are able to earn rewards and by virtue of doing so they implored the rest of us and let the entire nation's prosperity and allow us to defend ourselves. it was that vision that the founders brought to america with the crafted the declaration of independence. they said the creator and out us with unalienable rights among them life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. that last phrase we may not think about much but i think it is an important one. this would be a nation where we could pursue happiness and the way we choose. where we live, what profession we see, what job we get, how many kids we have, the freedoms we have, our ability to speak our mind. these abilities to pursue happiness as we wish define our nation and brought people all over the world -- pioneers, innovators, to this country. it is in our dna. the spirit of pioneering this would have allowed our economy to outperform the economies of europe from which many of us sprung. it has outperformed the most populous nations of asia. we are an opportunity nation. over the last several years, in particular under the leadership of president obama, government increasingly takes away our freedoms and the capacity of the beer can system and our enterprises to grow and thrive. this is a choice we are going
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to have to have. do we believe in a bigger government taking more from us and limiting what we achieved or do we believe in free enterprise and freedom and opportunity and a merit based society. do we vilify and demonize those who have been most successful or will we celebrate the success of all americans? these are the choices i think america will have to face. i spent my life in the private sector the first 25 years of my career. i know how the private sector works. i want to use those lessons to help washington and to make sure we once again restore the greatness that is i had the occasion to use those skills in state government. you remember i had the opportunity in four years. i found the same skills could be adjusted and applied in a way that allowed us to do a better job managing our state. we balance the budget every four years. states do that. businesses do that. we learn how to live within a budget. washington does not do that. i went to bring the skull to washington. when you are in business you have to get along with your customers, your suppliers, the regulators, the bankers, the investors, you have to work
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with each of these groups to have different interests and make sure you have a combination of the different interests. in washington we need somebody who will be able to get a long with people across the aisle. in my state of massachusetts there are a few democrats. my legislature was 85% democrat. and yet, i found a way to work with leaders among the democratic party and finding some common ground. neither side had to violate their principles. instead, we found some places where we could agree and work together to try to make things better for our state. that is desperately needed in washington. be called a leadership. leadership is the capacity to bring others to a common solution. to have a vision and the capacity to understand others need to build trust and have them know you are a person of character. to be able to follow and find
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solutions to our challenges. i but like to help the senator. she is a terrific person and a great leader for the people of new hampshire. i want to go in washington and work with her to help america. i want to do a lot of things. balance our budget, make america the most attractive place again for entrepreneur is and innovators. that is part of the mission i will have in washington. with that introduction, i will turn to you have you ask some questions. i will turn to you. this is the entrepreneur. is that a northern european name? >> sicilian. do i not look it? >> i will not try to spell it.
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>> loiacono. >> it takes a hand. you have to move your hand to see the word. >> mike and i are very involved in this election as we have been the most recent elections. -- my wife and i are involved in this election as we have been in most elections. i will offer a suggestion. it has nothing to do with the debates. none of us have gone through life having made a decision and always stuck through it the rest of our lives. some decisions absolutely. we have moved, changed his bosses, we have -- changed spouses, we have changed businesses, college majors, what i am trying to say is that i do not want a president or a leader who is inflexible. i do not want somebody who has made a decision on something may be 10 years ago and despite
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any new information, he will stick to that decision. you have been painted by some of your opposition both from the democrats and your fellow primary seekers as having flip- flop on some issues. i would not run away from that. i would say, yes, i have. new information has come and i have was an up or what ever. i do not want somebody who is just going to be full speed ahead toward the torpedos no matter what. things change. you look at history and one that we are friends with this country and the next day we are not. that is just something from somebody who has observed and watched. i do not think it is such a
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terrible thing to change your opinion on something. i think it would be useful to where it as a badge of courage. >> thank you. having had the experience of living in the private sector i have found that more than once i have been wrong. in the private sector if you do not recognize you are wrong and you keep sticking to a position you have before you have all the data you get in your experience, the call you stubborn. with time he would be likely to get your job. -- he would be likely to lose your job over the course of my lifetime, some of my views have changed. not as many as my opponents would suggest. one of those was on the issue of life and that was one where i thought i would have -- or i thought i had the answer when i was running for senate and then when i became governor. i was given a piece of legislation that would have created new life for the
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purpose of experimenting on it and then destroying it. this was an embryonic stem cell research. i could not sign a bill that would take life. i recognized that was a very different course than i had expected. i wrote an editorial in the boston globe describing why i made that decision and why was pro-life. i have been convinced of that ever since. thank you. >> i would like to ask a question. i have three ladies that are in their 80's that i am friends with. they are still in their own homes. the price of heating and taxes is a struggle. they have outlived their husbands. their interest rates have gone down. they all talk about buying a home with the 3% and 4%, but what can be done when you go to washington hopefully to help
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those people who have counted four years for that extra income each month and especially now with the world, it is hitting all three of them hard. >> it is really tough right now. you are fighting throughout this country that it is harder and harder on middle income families. seniors and middle income families that are just getting started, you are finding people by the virtue of the unemployment level and the cost of oil and food and people have all gone up. it is having a harder time. the best thing i can do is get the economy going again. the growth of the economy as such so people are going back to work, paying taxes, buying more things which will ultimately mean interest rates are not held onto virtually zero. we recognize that by holding interest rates as low as they are some of the people who are helping to refinance the financial-services sector that
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has been in such trouble our seniors who are seeing lower interest rates coming in month to month by virtue of low rates on cds and other investments. the best thing i can do is get the economy going. we can go back and look at the inflator is used for social security. i know there has been no adjustment in the last two or three years in part because the cpi has not shown any movement. people are really struggling. it breaks my heart to see so many folks in this country really having a hard time. part of that is because of an economy that is just in the doldrums and continues to be in the doldrums. it will continue to be liked germans have been in for a long time and japan has been for decades. we will be like this for a long time if we continue to act like europe. if we believe that the government can manage the economy better than free people pursuing their dreams.
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i want to get back to the point where america is once again the best place in the world for entrepreneurs and for inventors and businesses small and large to have -- when the head of coca-cola, talk about an american brand. when coca-cola's chief executive says america is less attractive from a business standpoint and china, a better environment there, that means the dollars are going over there. investment is happening there rather than here. i want to bring them back years our people create jobs here and build businesses here. that lives of our economy and will help all of those who invest in our economy whether it is with bonds or stocks or whether it is with cds. if the economy is strong and vibrant, the returns to all of us is vibrant the economy in trouble means a lot of middle income families in trouble.
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>> a interest what would -- what you would do specifically for the environment that is better for entrepreneurs in the land of opportunity you talked about earlier. >> i will call the seven major things that create an investment family and business family, job family environment that allows jobs to start to grow. actually, the seven are a summary of 59 different points i put in a little book. we may have some here. i will not take you through all of those. i am not sure i could take you to all of us. 7 i can do. one is to make sure the tax rates are competitive with tax rates on employers and other countries. right now we are the highest in the world by a lottery be are
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tied with japan. relative to europe, their tax rate is about 25% and hours is 35%. we need to get our tax rate down to be competitive with others. regulators and regulations have to recognize that their job is not just to catch the bad guys and keep at things from happening, but also to encourage the sector they are regulating to succeed. rather than burdening the private economy they need to encourage it. you know in the north country with the regulators say in and say you cannot camp in national forests, you cannot use -- the land has been set aside for small boat -- snowmobiling and so forth, the regulators think they are making things better but they hope -- they heard the economy. tourism and use of your national resources is something that is essential. regulators have to understand that is part of their job. it is encouraging the economy
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and the private sector. you have to have trade policies that opened up new markets for our goods and allow us to sell products where right now they are not going because of high tariffs. no. two, you have to make sure that the cheaters -- china has been a cheater but too often -- the cheaters are held accountable. we have to take advantage of our armed energy resources. we have a lot of energy in this country. oil, gas, coal, nuclear power, we have to take advantage of them instead of regulators trying to keep them from providing the resources we need. i was the head of a large chemical company, he said we just announced a $20 billion facility in saudi arabia. he said we would rather build in pennsylvania, but we could not count on the regulators to texas -- let us get access to the natural gas.
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we are talking about tens of thousands of jobs because of that decision. it is like the keystone pipeline decision. let's get our own energy in this country and that will help create jobs. you have to get the role of lot to get the environment right. what do i mean by that? we have something today called the crony capitalism or the president takes care of his friends. obamacare for instance. these units are give it -- the unions are given waivers. they do not have to worry about that burden because they are his friends. boeing is told they cannot build a factory in south carolina employing people because south carolina is not a union state. and this is an example of people up. indifference to positions of
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power with and give paybacks to the people who helped them out. we have to go back to the rule of law. we have to have institutions that create human capital. capitalism is about human capital. it is about education, immigration policies that bring in the best and brightest of other places that help the rest of us. if you want to businesses and small and large to make the risky decision of investing in america, they cannot be worried that we are going to hit a wall like greece or italy or spain. they have to say american will be stable long-term and the currency will be worth something. we have to quit spending more than we taken. we cannot keep going year after year barring an extra $1 trillion. i remember what president obama was highly critical of bush for debt -- deficits that were as high as $450 billion.
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and right he was to be critical. his have reached three times that it down. by the end of his first four years and hopefully his only four years, he will have put together as much public debt as all the prior presidents combined. almost. it is really extraordinary. those are the seven things that i would do and act upon immediately to make america an attractive place for entrepreneurs big and small so they have a desire to hire more people. that way people coming out of programs across the country, whether they will go into teaching -- word you go with statistics? what kind of job? >> may be a professor at the university. >> may be governed -- government leadership and responsibility. i want to make sure people with
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those skills have good jobs and incomes. we have wages that rise in america. over the last 10 years -- over the last four years, let me get the numbers right. the last four years the median income has dropped by 10%. this is a tough time. thank you. that is a long answer to a simple question. >> i want to know what your views are on bureaucracy in washington. a lot of the big departments, epa, health and human services, there regulations and telling everyone what to do. is there a way to cut that out and eliminated or cut it back? >> that is a darn good question. one of the challenges with too many regulators and bureaucrats is the create too many bureaucracies that become struggling for our lives and our economies. when i went into the state of
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massachusetts, i looked at our department of health and human services. we have 15 different agencies within the department. i said, can we not combine them? we got them into three different groups and that allowed us to have fewer lawyers, if your public relations or press secretaries. we were able to take out some of the overhead. he had some agencies like transportation and the environmental agency, the were always at each other's throats and arguing with each other. i said to we put them together? i put one person in charge of the three to make them work together and become more effective. we look back over my record in massachusetts for four years, and we did something i do not think many states can claim. if you look at all the agencies that report to the governor, all the departments whether it is the state police or folks and health and human services,
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part number of employees went down during my tenure. i look at washington and believe we should do three big things. one is to eliminate some programs. stop them altogether. it is not wise to keep borrowing money from china to pay for things we do not have to have. i will cut some programs out, even some i like. i will be calling on the american people to say we are willing to sacrifice the end of this program or that program because america cannot to going the way that it is. number two, i will take some programs like medicaid which is the health care program for the poor and send it back to the states. i think new hampshire can do a better job caring for the health care needs better than washington can. i was spent -- said some things back to the states. for the remaining portion of government, will cut the payroll by 10% through
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attrition. how will link the pay of government workers with the pay that exists in the private sector. [applause] i do not think people who are working as public servants should make a heck of a lot more than people who are paying their way. one more thing that i will mention in that regard, those who work in public sector unions, i do not think it is fear for their bosses to take dos out of their wages and it then for the boss to be able to decide which candidate or party to give it to a people want to contribute to candidates they should be free to do so. i do not think union bosses should be able to take hundreds of millions of dollars from union members and give it to who they want to give it to. that is what i will do to take on the bureaucracy in washington. you can be assured of this. if i become president of the
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united states, the people who work in government will be a smaller number than they are today. i am not discounting our president -- our troops. president clinton talked about shrinking the military. i would actually like to add personnel to the military so the burden is not as great on them as it has been the past couple of years. he told me i have to run. we are moving on down the road. come join us, we will take some questions there as well. i want to say thank you for your willingness to spend some time. i look forward to seeing you out there on january 10. thank you. [applause] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] [captioning performed by national captioning institute]
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[no audio] >> hear what the candidates are saying at the newly designed c- span website for 2012. >> the vast majority of those as far as money is concerned are operated by the state government. why? because they are state functions. another federal government thinks they have a role to play in doing something that is a state function. >> face those out to treat everyone the same dread wind, solar, what ever it needs to be. the huge federal government does not need to pick winners and losers in the energy industry. >> read the latest comments from candidates and political
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reporters and links to c-span media partners and the early stages at c- span.org/campaign2012. >> house speaker john boehner announcing the payroll tax compromise. this is under 10 minutes. now, house speaker john boehner announcing the payroll tax agreement with featured democrats. this is under 10 minutes. >> good evening, everyone. senator harry reid and i have reached an agreement on the payroll tax relief on behalf of the american people. key parts of these agreements are that on a january 1 no american worker will see an increase in their taxes. we will ensure that a new
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complex reporting burden is not unintentionally imposed on small businesses. this solution will prevent small businesses very new administrative burdens and ensure that american workers will see their tax relief as soon as possible. the senate will join the house and immediately deported conferees with instructions to reach an agreement on the full one year payroll tax cut deduction along with unemployment reforms and an extension of unemployment and the so-called topics for two years. its members will work to complete the one year extension that all of us want. we will ask the house and senate to approve this agreement by unanimous consent before
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christmas. middle-class families and small businesses are struggling. they are making sacrifices. i think this agreement will help our economy. one important provision that i want to highlight is the keystone pipeline. this project would create tens of thousands of jobs in our country. in this jobs project has bipartisan support in the house and senate. i hope the president will approve this pipeline to put those americans to work. i want to thank our members, particularly our conferees that have remained here in the capital with the holidays approaching for their efforts to enact a full-year extension of the payroll tax cut for working families. under this agreement, we will do that as quickly as possible. i do not think there is any tempers' celebration. our economy is struggling and
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there is a lot of work ahead of us in the coming year. i want to wish the american people a very merry christmas and a happy new year. >> de you have assurances that nobody will object on the house side that you have everybody in line? "i do not know that. our goal is to do this by unanimous consent. >> there are a lot of folks who are saying you take on this. did you cave in considering the fallout, is this the worst week under your leadership? >> sometimes it is hard to do the right thing. sometimes it is politically difficult to do the right thing. when everybody call for a one- year extension of the payroll tax deduction, when everybody wanted a full year of extended unemployment benefits, we were here fighting for the right things. it may not have been politically the smartest thing in the world, but let me tell you -- i think our members which
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they could fight. we were able to fix what came out of the senate. all year you have heard me talk about a short-term extensions, short-term gimmicks and the consequences they have for our e economy. when you look at this, it is another short-term extension. this creates uncertainty for job creators. i used to run a small business. i know how this works. kicking the can down the road for a couple of months does cause problems. when you look at the reporting requirement that came out of this bill because it was hastily put together, it was a big burden for businesses of all sizes. >> i know on saturday there was a link the open mike sessions.
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was that i decide not to have that this time. one member who i spoke with said you had been hung out to dry by the leadership because people were not allowed to speak this type. >> i did not set up conference calls. we have a lot of members with a lot of opinions. we have fought the good fight. i talk to eat enough members over the last 24 hours. -- i talked to enough members of the past 44 hours to say they do not like this two month extension and the reporting problem in the senate bill. if you can get this fixed, why not do the right thing for the american people even though it is not exactly what we want to? >> if somebody objects and it will not passed by unanimous consent, will you bring the house back for a vote next week? >> absolutely. >> given the whole last week
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and we have seen so often after fop and news topics on both sides, democrats are really charging that the radical two- party element of house republicans are to blame for this. do you think the whole fight was worth it? the you think you guys ended up getting a good compromise? >> doing the right thing for the right reasons is always the right thing to do. while everyone asks for a full year of extensions of these programs, a lot of people were not willing to put the effort and has the holidays were approaching to get it done. our members were. i am proud of the efforts they have put into this. it is not always easy to do the right thing. we believe that we came here to change the way this town does business. no more gimmicks, no more short-term this or that.
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it is time to do solid policy. it is time to do it the right way. thank you. >> after the deal was reached, the white house released a statement from president obama that said for several weeks i have stated consistently that it was critical that congress not go home without preventing a tax increase on 160 million working americans. day i congratulate members of congress for ending the partisan stalemate by reaching an agreement that meets that test. you can read the entire statement at our website, c- span.org. >> with the iowa caucuses and new hampshire primary next month, the cspan series," of the contenders" said 14 people who ran for president and laws that
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had a lasting impression on american politics. the series continues next week on monday. it is every night at 10:00 eastern on c-span. >> next, the latest news on the payroll tax cut deal reached late yesterday plus your phone calls and e-mails live on "washington journal." the house will come in this morning and is expected to sign off on a two-month extension by unanimous consent also a conversation on religion, ethics and the 2012 campaign. then an update on iran and north korea plus nuclear programs and a look back at last year's arms treaty with russia. later, a roundtable discussion on child care challenges in the u.s. u.s.
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