lt. governor talks about the latest developments in the obama administration birth control directives to religious institutions. and the former new york city corrections later and discusses a new survey about the cost of interrogation. washington journal is next. >> ♪ >> president obama will unveil his 2013 budget request to congress this morning. thousands of pages that make up four volumes. but there is an app that you can download for free on to your smartphone. the printed pages cost about $218. he will unveil the budget at 11:00 a.m. this morning. a proposal projects the deficit for 2012 will top $1.30 trillion

before falling to about $900 billion. mitch mcconnell said yesterday that he will offer obama's budget on the senate floor and will predict that it will fail. we will get to the budget later this morning. first, can recent time magazine wealthy orout the risk poor, does it matter for the oval office? you can also send us an e-mail or go to our twitter page. or post your comments on facebook. we already have some comments on our facebook page this morning. let me read one from william.

and then above that -- we want to hear from all of you this morning. how does this impact your votes, if at all? the time magazine piece is about it but history of presidential candidates and their path to the oval office. he says --

so we want to talk about this with all of new this morning, just get an idea of whether a president has been successful, wealthy, what does that make you think about them? how do you perceive them? richard norton smith is joining us on the phone to talk about the history of this topic. how has this played out in the past and give us examples on, it can evade being wealthy and a candidate being poor. >> wealth is a longstanding tradition in american politics,

trying to define a candidate by his economic status. we are a democracy and there are legendary campaigns where the whole idea of someone being a man of the people was attested to by his lack of wealth. this sometimes leads to very surprising results. abraham lincoln, who we all celebrate as being the embodiment of american success story, born in a log cabin, who went on to become successful cortisone efforts. as a young man he was accused of betraying his class, of marion into the aristocracy, a woman from a wealthy and kentucky family. he was a bear successful lawyer -- very successful lawyer and

this was used against him. in 1860 when lincoln was a presidential candidate, his supporters came up with a brilliant device to redefine him . supporters came forward to bearing a pair of a weathered looking -- that had been split by lincoln -- whether looking rails. the image of lincoln the rail splitter took root. who was the poorest president going in and coming out? guest: i don't know, but

d spent 25beefor years on capitol hill, during this first week on the job as someone when he could expect his first paycheck? he had a son who was about to go to college was the reason. millions of americans living paycheck to paycheck. it did not help him in 1976 in terms of getting reelected or establish a special bond between him and other people living paycheck to paycheck. there are those who do all sorts of studies of this and they say that george washington in modern terms would be the wealthiest president. that maybe. but george washington had to borrow money to attend his first inauguration. that said, if you were doing

class-based politics, you could look at washington's economic program, which was all about centralizing power in this new government, creating a national bank, assisting in district through alexander hamilton's various schemes. and you could look at washington and say this is a man who is governing with his own interests in mind. host: below your piece in the magazine there is a graphic that shows how much wealth presidents had the out of times. j.f.k. topped the charts at about $1 billion. kennedy personal lives off a $10 million trust fund drawn from a family fortune built on real estate investments and allegedly bootlegging. how was he able to relate?

he was a very wealthy man. guest: that's a great illustration of mine point. j.f.k. had the famous compound in hyannis port. he was a sailor and a very wealthy man, and he was, also, if perceived as anti-business, ironically. remember, there was an attempt by u.s. steel and other steelmakers to increase prices and the president got into a public row. privately he referred to as steel executives as a sons of bitches. he earned a reputation in some quarters as anti-business. point being that his welcome was trumped in the eyes of most voters by his economic policies, by his economics of a da .

the first president bush had a compound on the ocean in maine, had a cigarette boat and had the misfortune to be president during an economic recession in 1990, 1991, 1992. he did not pick fights with wall industry finance yiers for executives. what defined him for some people was a famous encounter that he had with a supermarket checkout scanner device. particularly this visual age, the age of television, was a kind of shorthand that developed. presidents can get defined very quickly and they can find it very difficult ones they are defined to shake that image. host: how much of an impact is

there -- how much impact in the past has its been -- let me try this again, if americans are doing well, does the gulf of a candidate matter? guest: what is in a president's bank account most of the time matters are less than what is in the average voter's bank account. what happens is in times of economic stress and distress, this really becomes an issue. sometimes to almost comical effect. the famous log cabin campaign in 1840 when the wigs attacked president van buren for spending public money on a bigger goals of the white house and they are portraits of their own candidates harrison content to live in a log cabin.

the fact is that he was born in virginia mansion, came from every distinguished aristocratic family, etc. ballyhoo, even then, almost 200 years ago. the spin doctors, the image makers, could take, particularly in times of economic distress, van buren had a few political advisers around him, they might have told him to stay away from the finger bowls. >> a little history lesson there. thank you, sir. now let's get your take on this. illinois,, meghan is a republican. welcome or poor, how does that impact your vote? -- wealthy or poor? caller: it makes no difference to me. my main concern is the senate and the house and their wealth,

because they are the ones that make the laws and rules that dictate what happens to we people. host: they control the purse strings. caller: exactly. that has more impact to me than what the president says. because the president's, and go every four to eight years. congress is there a forever. -- because presidents come and go. host: another caller, what do you think? caller: romney already has trouble relating to us. he has made millions of dollars and i don't think he has any notion of how the regular person lives. but on the other hand -- caller: let me just show you

how the gop presidential candidates stack up. they all have fortunes. $220 million for mitt romney. $7 million for gingrich. $4 million for ron paul. 1 million for rick santorum. caller: with newt gingrich, he has a similar problem to romney. newt has been busy making lots of money and being involved in going to tiffany's and buying expensive jewelry for a callista. i think both of them have a bad problem in that respect. but let me say that i think we are sort of headed toward a plutocracy in this country. you either have money or you are going to get money when you run for political office. the poor people, the people that don't vote or know what's going on politically, maybe 60% of people that don't vote in a presidential election, which is shocking, and that's why i say

we are headed towards a plutocracy, and that's what rich people want. they don't want the poor people voting. they want people apathetic and inactive. plutocrats controlling all livres a power. the executive, the traditional, and legislative. host: president obama comes in at $5 million on the start. most of that coming from books, popular books that he wrote. do you think president obama represents the 99%? caller: i would say that i was an obama supporter and i worry as a democrat and as an obama supporter, i worried that the president may lose touch with base democratic vote, the person struggling working from paycheck to paycheck. i worry that he is getting a

look of someone at. that does bother me. -- that he's getting somewhat e -- aloof. but the republican party has a much bigger problem with being corrupted by wealth. host: this person writes -- now mulberry, florida, melvyn is an independent. caller: ok. it does not matter whether they are rich or poor. it matters which party they belong to. republicans are going to give as much as they can to the rich. the democrats will give a good bit to the rich but will also help the middle class and the poor. as the candidate said in the

republican party, he said, "i ."n't worry about the poor what concerns me more and one of the biggest mysteries is how the biggest group that will vote against obama is a southern old people that live in confederate states that has white males with less than a high-school litigation supporting the republican party. yet by economic standards you would think they would vote democrat. in hollywood, the monied people always donates to the democrats and the economic standards you would think that they would

donate to the republicans. host: michael is a democrat in baltimore. go ahead. caller: the previous caller has an interesting point. i am part of the democratic base that are left. i vote democratic. so that is really not going to change. so it does not matter how much money they have for me. host: frank, a republican in augusta, georgia, york next. caller: my problem is this divisiveness over rich or poor. we are all americans. the problem we have right now is that we are being divided. we are all americans. the 50% that i heard you speak of them don't even vote or care, they should not be allowed to vote if they don't care. they should not be allowed to vote if they are getting things from the government, because they will vote whatever is given them.

over 40% of american people are on the dole from the government. we need to quite the divisiveness. host: what is the top 34 you're right now heading into the 2012 election? caller: number one, that we get more informaed. if we have obama four more years, i don't think i could survive it. host: that was frank, a republican in augusta, georgia. the president will unveil its 2013 budget request to congress. he will travel to northern virginia community college of at 11:00 a.m. this morning to deliver remarks to the students there about the budget, what is in it and what his agenda is. we will have live coverage of that on c-span this morning, 11:00 a.m. eastern. c-span.org if you want to tune in for that.

republicans will be responding to the president's's budget. senate republican member jeff sessions is the budget ranking member in the senate. and republican senators are holding a press conference today at 1:30? in response to the president's budget plan. look for our coverage on that as well,. a lot happening today in washington in response to the president's 2013 budget report. go to c-span.org to find out all we are covering on that. we will continue with questions this morning, getting your take on this question that we have for you. wealthy or poor -- does it impact your votes? let's talk to josh. caller: good morning, c-span. the topic today is not very important to me. i've done a lot of reading on economics. the silly thing about the

question is here we are a nation trillions of dollars in debt and yabbies politicians making millions of dollars. debt --re in that much of that it is not a relative question. if you can give me a politician up there that can describe the mechanics of why we are in the state we are -- we don't need a race car driver, peter chris carr mechanic driving the show right now. host: you are an independent. who would be the best person running right now to steer this economy? >> the doctor. you know who i am talking about. the only doctor that is up here running for president. he can fix this. you have to learn your economics. you have so many smart people, educated people calling in that

to understand monetary policy and have been reading the books. it's all over the internet. host: we will delve more into the budget and how it works, a process, this morning at 7:45 a.m. eastern. we will speak with douglas told reagan, former cbo director during the bush years -- douglas holtz eagan. president obama and most of his $5 million wealth from books. i want to show you how the gop candidates were able to make their money according to this "time" magazine piece. romney made a living turning around struggling economies at bain capital. newt gingrich made $7 million after 20 years in congress, turned into a consulting and the

novel writing and public speaking. we will get back to the question about whether wealth or property impacts your vote. we have a correspondent for the wall street journal joining us. let's talk about the president's goal and what does it mean for his agenda for 2012 and is this also campaign tactic? >> this is mostly a political document. i think everybody would knowledge that the chances of any of this becoming law are very slim except for perhaps on the margins. he's doing a statement of values, what is going to run on for reelection and what he would do if he won a second term. host: laura, you said it's

probably not going to pass. why do you say that? republicans in the senate after bin after democrats for not putting a budget on the floor. i mean, where does the request though it's not going to pass? guest: what you have on one hand its annual spending congress has to improve that call discretionary spending. every year the president makes proposals and congress then enacts goes into law or puts their own version of those in turlock. that is across the agencies, military spending and domestic spending, to figure out how much each program will get. the reason why this budget is a little less consequential than most is usually looking for what the total spending proposed is. but of total spending numbers were agreed to as part of the debt ceiling deal last summer. so we already know what the caps are going to be. president obama's budget adhere

to those caps. of course congress is expected to adhere to those apps as well. there are questions about underneath that, how do you divide it up. it's a tight budget because the overall discretionary spending is not rising very much. just barely more than it was the previous year. they will have to decide within each program, does heating assistance get less or does the program that helps to bring get more? it's those kinds of decisions back to be made. the president's proposal was certainly got the process, but congress will make its own decisions. on the bigger budget questions, things like should taxes go up and should you change the rules around medicare and medicaid and social security's, the really big programs that are automatically funding each year? that's the kind of stuff that really is not expected to go anywhere this year. host: on social security and medicare, you expect him to try to reform those? guest: he does not make any

changes on social security. last year during the budget talks that he had with speaker john boehner, he did make some concessions on social security spending, but those were never -- never went for because there were not able to seal a deal. medicare and medicaid, he proposes a more modest reductions in the range of about $320 billion between those two programs. those are cuts to providers and other changes on some co- payments or participants, but they don't make the big structural changes in the program that would save a lot of money. for instance, raising the eligibility age for medicare. he does not propose that. taxes, he has a total of $1.50 trillion over 10 years and tax increases. comes from a variety of places, ending the bush-era tax cuts for those earning over 250 cows and dollars a year is a big chunk of the money. he also proposes increases on --

bigger increases on families earning over $1 million a year. in addition, there are some corporate loopholes, corporate tax and bandages that they would -- host: what about jobs? guest: he also has some spending proposals. you should spend more upfront in order to stimulate the economy and then deal with the deficit in long-term. he proposes infrastructure spending and proposes aid to states, opposes a variety of things, renewing the payroll tax, which will expire at the end of this month -- i'm sorry, the payroll tax deduction. he has a short-term spending increase that he's been talking about several months. host: and what can we expect in the pentagon budget? guest: the pentagon budget has been reduced compared with where it was projected to go.

the defense department laid out a lot of the details already. it is definitely a tighter budget. they are no longer saying that they will have the ability of fighting two wars at once. they are -- it is definitely a much tighter pentagon budget than we're used to seeing. of course, the bigger question around the pentagon is there are some looming much bigger cuts of about a half trillion dollars in defense cuts that would kick in for 2013nd of this year port unless congress finds a way to replace those with other deposit reductions. >> laura, thank you very much for your time. first, will you download the free app that allows you to read all four volumes of the budget? guest: yes, luckily i don't

have to do it. my news room has a system for getting all the information to our computers for us. the process is amazing. the news media has a process as well. there's an enormous amount of time spent looking at these budget documents. they are distributed to reporters across our newsroom. everybody looks on their own individual beats at how the decisions would affect programs they cover. there's an enormous amount of expense covering the budget rollout. it's a little ironic, given the fact this is a large bowl. you can expect lots of people looking at those documents. host: thank you very much. guest: you're welcome. host: we will dig into the details tomorrow morning spending the first hour with a budget reporter going into what the president proposes and how people on capitol hill have responded. how the president plans to roll this out, this article from the new york times this morning --

and the yesterday on the talk- show circuit on sunday, president obama's top official on the budget was making the rounds and was on several shows. here's what he had to say about president's budget. >> the challenge is how do you put money for word for things

like a payroll tax holiday, things like getting a don't start on infrastructure, building schools, and make the decisions for long-term deficit- reduction? the president has made a proposal to do that and was willing to negotiate a bipartisan agreement that we are doing. host: already getting some republican responses. top republican on the senate budget committee has said this yesterday about the budget. and mitch mcconnell said yesterday that he will put the president's budget on the floor for votes. he did that last year and it failed obamacare. mitch mcconnell predict the same fate for the president's 2013

budget request. we are talking about what the impact is on your votes for president. thanks for waiting. you are on the air. caller: a quick question. i don't care out wealthy or poor. what i really want is the brightest man. the minute i say that it creates a problem. i experience the eight years of bush and the republicans and some really smart people scammed us, misled us, did everything in the world to keep us from understanding what was going on with the tax breaks for the rich and the war and what it was costing us and what it was doing to our economy. came crashing down before there was any real reaction. of what a smart person, i just don't want them to abuse me with their intellect.

host: given what you said, here's a headline in many of the papers this morning -- do you think austerity is the way we need to go, given our economic situation? caller: of course not. a business cannot operate without money. if it does not have money to operate, it will go bankrupt. the same as would happen with a household. we need taxes based on society needs. the society needs food, shelter, and security. suv's and mini mantids don't give us food, shelter, or security. if we have to drive a smaller

car or live in a smaller house or reduce some of our luxury's so that we can half -- so we can take care of the elderly and -- in this country you have the mentally ill living under viaducts and in grocery carts. the only way to meet our needs is through taxes. host: an independent from massachusetts, what's your take on the question? wealthy or poor? caller: it does impact my vote. a lot of our politicians today are rich and dealing with a lot of money. they are men with power. money always plays a role in the decisions that they make and what they do. so it does affect things for me. rich people a lot of times, very rich people, especially people

with money and power, they really cannot relate to poor people all the time. it is obvious. host: you plan to vote in 2012? caller: i will vote for obama again because all the choices out there, i don't see any of these guys doing anything really -- doing any more for the poor people that has not been done already. i think we have a better chance with obama and what we have in place right now. if you don't have an understanding of what poor people are dealing with, then you are going to always make laws and the decisions that does not really help anybody but yourself and the group you are interested in. host: president obama's wealth captured at $5 million in this piece. would you call him a wealthy man? caller: yes, i am low income, so $5 million is wealthy, very wealthy. $5 million could buy me a house, starting a business, take care

of my children's future. that is well. people living in that bracket sometimes don't understand what poor people have to go by on a day-to-day basis. -- that is wealthy. fortimes i don't like it every day people to be labeled as main street. that does not make me feel like they are related to me when they call us main street. they cannot really relate with poor people. right now government is about making money for corporations and rich people. poor people always have to pay the price. we are the ones with the least money, but we always pay the most. host: a republican in oklahoma city now, vance. caller: good morning. personal wealth of the president is not important in my mind, not as much as the way in which he

structures the class warfare argument. i want to make this point. republicans should happily embrace the class warfare argument, but they should do it in a way that is different than the democrats and such. the way they should do it is this, they should say that those who are making money off of government ought to be the ones who are heavily taxed, because they are part of the state structure of abortion. of coersion. republicans often argue that government is the robber where the robber is pointing a gun and saying your money or your life ? but that's not the whole story. republicans should also

understand that the government is not just the robber but the man holding the bag where the robber said put your jewelry into this bag. the bag man often corporations and banks and will be doctors getting money from medicare and medicaid. all of these people are the people that republicans should be running against and heavily taxing if they take money from any federal, state, municipal, or foreign governmental source. i am a ron paul libertarian. ron paul actually said on a show that these are the kind of people that should be taxed heavily. i think that is the best way it for republicans to refrain but. class but. cindy has this tweet --

and this article, romney runs as an outsider but makes room for lobbyists in his campaign. and then the politics section of the washington times, santorum says --

and a piece about mitt romney evolving on your marks. it says that run it takes a hard line against congressional earmarks now as a presidential candidate -- speaking of cpac and the maine straw poll, mitt romney scored two minor but symbolically important victories on saturday --

ron paul said in the mail that suggests collusion without mentioning romney by name. this article says ron paul has been left behind. the republican party in maine says there was no mr. if there and it comes down to 1 precinct. it was not certain that the 1 precinct would have made the difference for ron paul in that state. real quickly, newt gingrich in need of cash is the headline in the new york times this morning about his campaign. he will be off the campaign trail this week, much like he was recently, heading to california for three-day swing in the states in hopes of raising more money. campaign,he obama's this headline in the washington post this morning says that today he will unveil a reelection trio upsets dedicated

to providing supporters information on the president's record and more than a little dirt on his republican rivals. the goal is to are millions of surrogates with the facts, figures, and talking points they need to engage in ground level political combat. that's in the washington post this morning. and your update on 2012 political news. for our coverage of campaign 2012, go to our web site, c- span.org. ted is an independent in west virginia. talking about the impact of wealthy or poor on your votes, does it matter to you? i think i had the wrong line. let me move on to jackie, a democrat in north carolina. caller: yes, it does matter whether the president is rich or poor. i think president obama is doing a beautiful job.

he is really trying. this problem is is dealing with a party of no. that's why he cannot get anything accomplished. i will vote for him again. host: mike is a republican in virginia. what do you think? caller: hi there. i am very disappointed in what i hear the caller is talking about. it is the same old stuff we hear every presidential election cycle. the business of the rich versus poor? it is all a lot of baloney at this point. people are not addressing the real problem that is under the surface that nobody is addressing. that is the fact that the national debt is undermining the dollar. the dollar has been undermined. it goes back a long way. it goes back 80 years to franklin d. roosevelt. not that i told roosevelt

completely accountable for this, but it goes on. republicans and democrats alike for years and years and years. we are not willing to face up to this fact that it is no longer enough to try to rein in the deficit. training in the deficit continues to add to the debt. host: front page of the washington post on what's happening in washington this week, a key visit for china and the united states. and the incoming president is expected to be on capitol hill

meeting with members of congress. we will talk about that issue later on this week. then here's the headline in the wall street journal. and in several papers this morning. contraceptive plan still draws heat. the president's ruling on friday, this so-called compromise still drawing heat from the bishops and catholic voters. we will talk about that on a washington journal with kathleen kennedy townsend coming up at 8:30 a.m. eastern. one last question from an independent in washington. fred, go ahead. caller: i was thinking that it does not matter if the president is rich or poor, because there are rich people on the side of the poor people like ron paul and they try to help the poor. so does not matter if the president is rich or poor. it is important whether he is

corrupt bornite at. -- whether he is corrupt or niot. the taxpayer pays for the votes with blood and taxes. they get the money and we still pay. [unintelligible] enron, a lot of situations like that, we see the taxpayer has to keep picking up the tab special interest but runs the country. this happens over and over. so we need politicians in congress, they are there for a long time, they should be innocent people and not corrupt. by in a sense i mean good people, not corrupt and they take care of their country as a whole.

host: we understand. thanks. thanks for all of our callers and we will continue our conversation looking at the budget coming up with douglas holtz-eakin, a former director of the congressional budget office. we will be right back. " if you missed the latest on c- span, subscribe to our youtube channel and we will notify you of the newest video posts including signature interview programs, "road to the white house," and campaign 2012. >> there was a tragic episode in beaumont, a race riot broke out here on june 15, 1943. there was a story about a black man having raped a white woman.

when this story spread into the shipyards, several thousand of the shipyard workers -- some say at least 2000 shipyard workers came out of the shipyard and came downtown to the city hall and to the police department to try to find the person who had allegedly committed this crime. >> there are hundreds of videos to choose from online. subscribe at youtube. >> should your president not have the highest moral and ethical standards and be an example to our children and young people in this country? ask yourself that question. should his life not make you a role model for your future of children? should anyone you elect to this office always keep his promises? >> as candidates campaign for president this year, we look back at 14 men who ran for the

office and lost. go to our web site c-span.org to see video of the contenders who have a lasting impact on american politics. >> do they not have the right to protest and revolt against a government that they feel the is not serve their interests? who appointed us to sacrifice the lives of young americans trying to weigh in on the side of a government that represents perhaps 15% of the people of lebanon and has little or no apparent support from the other 85%? span.org/thecontenders. >> a look impact of mobile networks on society and improving spectrum use at the consumer electronics show. we will have the president and ceo of the world's largest provider of mobile networks. and what is an ultrabook, and

the latest on smartphones, tonight at 8:00 eastern on c- span 2. >> "washington journal" continues. >host: we're back with the director of the congressional budget office from 2003-2005. you are prominently displayed on the front page of the washington times this morning. guest: let's find out what i've done. host: his budgets have never added up and he has a propensity it as a very powerful campaign trail. that's on the front page. what you mean, it has never added up? guest: my concern is this. the first budget he put out showed the u.s. going into a spiral. we were borrowing simply to pay interest on previous borrowing. that's not sustainable.

world credit markets say forget it to that kind of thing. crisis, they said, we have to do this. the next year they put out a budget that did exactly the same thing. he said this is really a problem, we have to address this. so he appointed a commission that came forth with a set of proposals that made sense. it said the fundamental problem is spending, so republicans need to get over the fact that there is defense spending and you need tax reform. here we are with budget #four. still projecting to be something that looks like a third world debt crisis and we have yet to see a serious proposal on tax reforms. we have yet to see if he will preserve the social safety nets for the next generation of poor americans and seniors. those strikes me as the seminal

issues of our time. a great debate over fairness. the fundamental injustice is being perpetrated at the moment is to our children, who will inherit a load of debt that is unimaginable. and an economy that is not performing as well as it should be, if we are not careful. it's a big issue. host: is now the time really to do all those things you are talking about, medicare, social security, and can we really afford to cut spending and raise taxes right now? when you have a fragile economy? guest: big about social security. any restructuring of social security would be an attempt to avoid the current plan, which is to cut benefits 23% across-the- board in a couple years. that's a terrible plan. you would exempt would exemptwho

people who are already retired and those nearing retirement. that would change the plan and send a signal to people who are my age and younger that there will be social security there for you when you retire and send a signal to world lenders that the u.s. is responsible. that's what we should do. host: can we still for the bush- era tax cuts? guest: we need to actually talk about a tax reform so we can fix the loopholes people have identified, raise the necessary revenue. and produce a tax code that people perceived as fair and allows us to compete internationally. the problem is business taxes, which are crippling corporations. host: president obama's budget is expected to say let's raise taxes on those that make more than $250,000 per year, in order to help. guest: the question is how do

you raise those taxes? if you take the buffett rule, as it turns out the average tax rate for people making a million dollars is 30%, so the budget will not change the taxes paid by those people. some pay less than 30%. the reason they pay less is the tax code is not there just for parents. it reflects social equity goals. there's terrible contribution, car education subsidies. higher education subsidies. if someone is lowering their taxable income, it's because they are contributing in a another way. we have a $1.30 trillion deficit. that's less than 3 since on the dollar. let's fix the tax code. putting forward bad tax policy. host: is it possible this could

happen in the short term? why not try to do something? to? guest: the issue is not raising revenue now. the question is how to raise it. republicans signed on to the es-simpson plan. we have seen the stamping year after year and it may be politically advantageous. but it's not serving the nation. they are not capable of becoming law and not addressing the real problem. host: the president's budget is expected to assume an extension of the payroll tax-cut and assume the extension of unemployment benefits. there's an opinion piece in the wall street journal that the safety net need to stay in place. he writes --

guest: i -- and i think everyone i-- expected this to happen already. there seems to be no disagreement about fixing repayment for doctors in medicare and extending unemployment insurance and extending the payroll tax holiday. everyone here says it's to happen and it's not. i would like to see it progress on that made quickly. host: republicans might lose the battle perception-wise with american voters. guest: i think the democrats

face an equal risk. washington is very popular at the moment. that includes the white house, the senate, and the house. in the senate, the president's budget is dead on arrival. arry reid says we're not able to do about it. the leader of the senate does not even want to look at it, something is seriously wrong. host: democrats last week proposed reducing the 99 weeks to 93 weeks of unemployment. would you say that is modest? guest: that is modest. from research we know that if you give someone an unemployment benefits, it allows them to maintain their standard of living, allows them to have the wherewithal to search for better job. second, along with they do that, the more their skills deteriorates and the job they

ultimately get pays them less and does not serve them well. somewhere in there there's a balance no one knows the magic number. host: have republicans proposed too aggressive aeriform? we havet's over what typically done in a recession. host: 26 weeks. guest: we are so far away from the norm. host: let's get to phone calls. talking about president obama's 2013 budget that he will release today at 11:00 a.m. eastern time. ron is a republican in pontiac, an illinois. caller: good morning, mr. director. i would like you to confirm or correct some numbers for me. as i understand it, with long- term interest rates at historic lows, the government is borrowing currently at roughly 2% if you combine the three-

month, 10-year, 30-year and all that. with that the borrowing, we are paying an interest approve soon hundred $86 billion a year, i think, on our debt as it currently stands -- $286 billion. in a normal interest rate environment that would typically be 4% to 6% for government borrowing, which would mean a if we are projecting a 10 years of deficit-reduction, we all have to include an extra $2.8 trillion because the interest rates will double? guest: your numbers are about right. but concern is that we do have extraordinarily low interest rates at the moment. we should all hope for higher interest rates because it would signal a return to normalcy in

the economy. i am one of those who is deeply worried about the u.s. debt for the future. among the reasons i'm worried is right now the u.s. debt is over 100% bigger than the size of the economy. the history of the research says if it's over 90%, you grow more slowly. and second, you have a much higher probability of getting in trouble, greek-style trouble and we don't know when. getting a handle on that is important. the second thing with countries that get in trouble, they rely heavily on short-term debt. then suddenly you are stuck. when you look a president's budget from last year and the numbers this year, over 10 years, still running a deficit of $1.20 trillion.

$950 billion of it was interest. when interest rates go up, that's a disaster. host: are you talking about borrowing from before his administration? >> no, when i say previous borrowing i am talking about just outstanding debt. it's just getting under a credit card to pay off the old one. we are the largest, strongest economy on the planet with an enormouswe have an enormous capo survive things. and we are not immune from a loss of direct -- of arithmetic. host: this twitter message -- if corporations are being crippled with taxes, wire they being -- making record profits? guest: about half of them were in europe. europe is already contributing.

the concern over the corporate tax is that it is largely paid for by u.s. workers. evidence is increase the growing that 70% -- 70 cents of each $1 of tax is paid for with jobs lost. it has perverse impact. one of the reasons it does that is our tax is way higher than anywhere else in the world. and we tax in a way that was correct for the 20th century, but out of line with the 21st century. if germany is selling in brazil, those companies pay only a brazilian tax. we are double taxing the companies and losing the big, international markets. host to we want to get your reaction to jacob bloom yesterday, talking about the president's budget.

he responded to criticism that president obama had promised to cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term. >> when the president took office, we were losing 750,000 jobs per month. last month we gained 250,000 jobs. we have less revenue coming in. there was a deeper hole to dig out of than anyone could have envisioned. host: we have heard -- guest: we have heard this before. each time the projected deficit comes up they control the pen -- comes up, they do control the pen. those numbers do not reflect what they inherited, they reflect the choices that they

think they want to make. that is my concern. they have the ability to make those budgets add up, and they do not. i used to laugh, because i thought there was a secret memo in the west wing somewhere. when president bush came into office, remember, there was a recession and national crisis. 9/11, enormous deficits for the time. he promised to cut them in half. the deficit, not even cut in half. host: does that make a cbo director cringe when they hear things like that? promising to cut the deficit in half? guest: i do not know why we do not get rid of it. at some point, we have to pay the bills.

host: good morning. caller: good morning. it concerns me that senator reid will unilaterally state that he does not consider the budget and says that we do not need a budget. is it not a constitutional issue at stake here? please answer. thank you. guest: it is not a constitutional issue. in the american system we do not actually have an official budget system. the house and the senate are expected, under the budget act, to pass the resolutions. it is agreed on that plan through the congress, but the president never signed it. getting the white house, the house, and the senate on the same page is difficult at best. host: the role of the appropriators in all of this? guest: they have been

historically and interested in having budgets placed on them. that has been a constant battle. host: it is a turf battle on capitol hill that leads to this? guest: yes. host: new york, democratic caller. caller: thank you. i have been wanting to know, why is it that everyone is putting such pressure obama and no one will tell the real reasons why we are in the deficit. bush paid for nothing. he is the one that ran things in there. why not go and talk about him? [unintelligible] host: we are listening. caller: i just wanted to say that. i am not trying to be nastier anything. i just want to know, why is it that white people think -- that

is the only problem with the president -- the white people, he is not white and they cannot bring him under their thumb. host: ok. let's take her point about bush not paying for things. democrats bring that up. the two wars were not part of the budget. guest: it is someone that no one can defend. the practice of putting those war chests on supplemental appropriations gave them the appearance of being temporary, in some sense. then the house budget chairman criticized the administration for this. it was a big part of the deficit.

again, entirely deficit financed. look at that and you will see it a number of times. what you find is that of the increase in the deficit against what bush inherited, 50% is economic performance. a big recession, a big dot com bubble bursting. of the rest, it is about 16% on the tax and spending side. to my eye, the biggest mistake of that era, roughly the first 10 years of this century, we did not fix social security, medicare, and medicaid. we did not fix the foreseeable future problems. in a crisis, we lost our cushion and it is harder. host: you think that that was the time to do it?

guest: i am saying the same things the day that i was saying in 2003 and i am tired of hearing myself talk about it. it is a big missed opportunity. host: we want to get your take on this, from the outlook section of -- section of "the washington journal." -- "the wall street journal." guest: personally, i have never been in the double dip camp. i have always seen the u.s. has recovering, and recovering slowly.

i think that the economy is growing by about -- going about 2% per year. which reflects the resilience of the economy. there are lots of reasons to be more optimistic. the trouble is that it has taken too long. when you look at the policies that you should worry about in an environment like june, 2009, you should not be looking at jump-start or sugar bursts of economic policy. you should be wondering what kinds of deep, structural things can be done on a sustained basis. again, that was my deepest discontent with that budget. none of those deep structural changes. host: pete, go ahead, republican line. caller: i have a ph.d. in chemistry. i started my own business in

1969. when i turned over the business to the day-to-day operations to my two sons, we had 700 some odd workers and employees. i have two broad points. as president, we're very concerned. look at what he did when he lied about the moratorium on the gulf. there was evidence that what he was doing was unconstitutional, including the district court of appeals. we cannot count on this president to be definite in the kinds of decisions that he might make. he cannot tell us what to do and how to do it, and so forth. right now the bush tax cuts are going to expire and the marginal tax rate for guys like us is going to be 59.6. you look at obama care, and there is already a 3.8%

surcharge. there's also, for the self- employed, 3.84 medicare taxes. it adds up to a marginal tax rate of 47.2%. at 8% to 10% state and local and your businesses and we are looking at? near 60% coming out of the marginal tax break. host: what sort of write offs do you have? caller: sorry? host: what kind of deductions, write offs? caller: it does not matter. we are talking about taxes on profits. one of my $500,000 boilers goes down, i had better damn well have some money to pay for it. when i have to send it to the federal government and other entities, that money is not there. i am not a community organizer, shaking down companies.

when i need money, i need to pay for it. guest: he is right, those are the marginal tax rates at the top, under the combination of laws. the reality in the united states is that we tax many of our business entities through the individual income tax. it is impossible to disentangle tax policy toward the idle rich as opposed to tax policy for the productive rich. it plagues us. this is one of the reasons that the bowls simpson commission, which the president appointed, and all of those commissions that have looked at the u.s. problems have said -- we need a tax form so that we can get a handle on the marginal rates and revenue that we need. host: another question from twitter --

guest: so, there are many things that are runoffs, subsidies, and tax forms the to clean out. the biggest thing that is misleading is that u.s. taxes paid -- remember the first thing that comes to is paying taxes in the home country abroad. add up the total tax burden, it is more than the competitors. host: neil, new york. caller: i appreciate your openness in describing some of the details in taxes, tax rates, and tax codes. all too often on c-span and other channels that deliver information, people leave so much off the table and speak out of context. when i hear about warren buffett talking about his secretary

making x amount of dollars and paying less than he does, it is ridiculous. he does not work for a living. he is a passive income man. anyone in the united states is entitled to passive income. people who have money and do not have money, whether they're making to utter and $50 per year or per week, they can take advantage of the sales tax. people that speak about tax, they want to look at tiny details taken out of context and deliver these messages to the public that are completely untrue. guest: i concur with the sentiment with -- in that one of my frustrations is that washington is always talking about taxes. there is a lot to tax policy. how you raise the money often

matters more than how much to raise. the taxes that are important to me are not the ones that would make me a media star. and sometimes you do get to say that. host: as a former director of the cbo, when you look at the president's budget on taxes and the tax code, what goes into calculating that? guest: you often have these initiatives that do not have a lot of details where we do not really know what it means. a new additional tax, is it a reform of the existing alternative minimum? how are you going to do this? the president's budget should reveal exactly how its done. he talks about another alternative minimum tax for corporations and what that really means. he talks about tax breaks for manufacturers, including high- tech manufacturers. the last person to get one of

those credits, mcdonald's qualified. high-tech, these things matter enormously. if you step back, my concern is, without sounding like a broken record, that is not tax reform. that is stuff that is chosen for specific constituencies. we need a real tax reform that raises the revenue. host of democratic caller, alabama. caller: -- host: democratic caller, alabama. caller: the wars were not added to the deficit. to solve social security, all you need to do is lift the cap. everyone can make money to pay on that. social security is extracted from the government. when you do not give people a raise on social security, these

people spend their money every month. you are part of the problem, part of the bush administration, which is voodoo economics. everything that bush did is still adding to the debt. guest: it did. the caller is wrong about the medicare part b budget, the wars were funded by supplementals. but the way that it accumulates is the money comes in, goes out, the difference goes up. if spending happens, you borrow to cover it. you do not raise taxes, you borrow to cover it. the different pieces of the deficit are what the cbo has done again and again. that is the state of play. host: this comment from twitter --

guest: it was a huge missed opportunity, in my view. a plan that no one could find the warts in. it did not get 100% of the votes from both sides of the aisle, but it got elected representatives on both sides considering a serious fix. host: would it have passed? guest: we will mono. the reality is that unless a president takes the leadership, you do not get these big changes. only a president can say to the members of his party -- go to the other party -- and say that i will not sign this unless it is in there. in the absence of white house leadership, we drift. host: regina, republican line,

pennsylvania. caller: the previous caller said someone does not like obama because of color or something. no one looks at the spending that went on. we have a presidential candidate named dr. ron paul. he is a congressman that went back to stop the debt limits from being raised in the campaign, in order to do what he has been doing for years. he has been going after these unconstitutional increases, including rick santorum, and i heard a man calling in yesterday like it was his hero. he passed the big boondoggle for the taxpayers to fund. the government goes more and more broke. host: we're running out of time. i want douglas holtz-eakin to analyze it for you and others the ron paul plan.

guest: it is extremely ambitious. let's be clear. i do not think that there is anything close to unanimity in the congress to get it through. it is far too aggressive, unilateral disarmament. what is aggressive, it is not politically realistic. most of the things that we need to do our large. if they are not, the other parties are going to start overturning it the first chance that they get. my hope is to get something closer to what the white house and congress understands. we will make some progress on those issues. host: independent caller, louisiana. caller: good morning. looking at the tax situation, going back, i am 63 and i have quite a memory of me. i go back to the beginning of

this war, class warfare, instituted by ronald reagan. he shifted the tax burden from the wealthy and corporations, basically my taxes, middle-class taxes, doubled during the reagan administration. along with that, minimum-wage as had been held down for three decades. considering that this money from higher wages would go into the treasury. if people made more, there would be more in the treasury. they are having their cake and eating it as well. the class warfare, the use to be

a 70% margin at the time, and it needs to be again. as far as the united states corporations being taxed more than others, we lead the charge and the rest of the world had to be competitive with us. it has left the world in a helluva mess. our answer is to abandon this insane experiment with supply- side economics and go back to a keynesian model, where we can share the wealth and have more taxes paid into the treasury. host: all right. douglas holtz-eakin? guest: first of all, i think it the big difference is between us and the next generation and the fundamental injustices we are about to leave them. we have a fundamental choice to make. we cannot support the spending programs of the currently have

by simply taxing the wealthy. there is simply not enough money there. the nonpartisan entity in washington said that the top tax rates would have to be 90% and 80% to balance it over the next couple of years. that just is not feasible. if we want to have an enormous government, the middle class can pay a lot more taxes. i have done calculations that showed that if we are going to look like europe, the middle class and europe pay a lot more taxes. the middle class has to pick up the burden of an enormous state. we could try to go down that route. i would argue that it would impinge economic growth and we would regret it. or we can get realistic about spending and raise the revenue in a sensible fashion. host: on the keynesian philosophy, here's a piece that was recently written in "forbes

magazine." "when the cbo looks guest: that is basically correct. their job is to provide economic forecasts ended budget forecasts over what the congress has considered. they cannot do it based on a particular director. they have to do it based on what is out there in the literature. the reality is that most business cycle models, formal attempts to capture what goes on in the economy, has a keynesian

foundation. you get out what you put in. you cannot get a stimulus package that fails in those models. directors are cautious when they look at results, to be from here to here, they say that there is a big range involved. it reflects the fact that there is not a lot of confidence to forecast, when possible. host: is it necessarily a bad thing that is used by most cbo directors? guest: the bad thing is that there's no real alternative. when we did analysis, we had keynesian analysis and pure neoclassical and out -- analysis. it had a range of results and i like that presentation better. host: last call, bill, alabama.

caller: is it not true that when bush came into office that he made statements like the bud -- the government is receiving too much money from the surplus? the bush tax cuts, maybe netting a few hundred thousand dollars for individuals in the country, leading the state into trillions of debt. i do not get the comparison between tax cuts and individuals where the country goes into debt with trillions. is there some kind of comparison between individuals and a relatively few dollars causing the country to go into debt? they did not make sense then, and do not now. grover norquist has officials signing pledges that say no more taxes. unbelievable. where do you get this kind of

reasoning? thank you. guest: at the moment that president bush took office, the cbo had projected $5.6 billion over 10 years. a typical number in the u.s. is 18%. we have reached about 20%. i was not around at that time, but the logic on the campaign trail was that we have high taxes and a surplus, so give a tax break. it was a percentage reduction across the board. history is a cruel master. we have seen that those surpluses were very illusory. they were driven a lot of by thedot com bubble -- by the dot com bubble. very typical of the 21st century, housing bubble followed by not rapid recoveries.

we will have to rethink how we think about these policies. host: president obama will talk about his budget today, traveling to community colleges outside of washington, to talk to students about what is in his budget proposal. shortly before that, they will be releasing a free app. if you really want to, you can download all four volumes of the budget you're smart phone. guest: i encourage you. and [laughter] host: sounds like fun reading. douglas holtz-eakin, people responding to the president's budget, all the different agencies will be talking about their separate budgets. there will be response from republicans as well. the office of management and budget will be talking at 12:30 today, live on c-span. you can see it on your television.

look at all the different things we are covering the president's budget. we will talk about it tomorrow in the first hour. dig deeper into the details, once we know them. on the republican side, let's go to this twitter message -- host: i wonder what you are thinking about republican proposals out there to help lower the deficit by freezing federal pay, their salaries. what kind of tent does it make? caller: -- guest of the numbers are not large. that is the reality -- guest: the numbers are not large. that is the reality. countries have done this before. the poster child for getting it right is actually canada, in the mid-1990's, which had debt to gdp over 100%. what do you do? tax reform. what is missing in the arsenal

so far, cutting government spending. but not all spending is created equal. you want to create certain -- keep certain infrastructures. we do not have a lot of government employees and transfer programs, which in the u.s. largely means getting the fix for the next generation. host: people might look at canada and say -- well, they provide free health care. comparisons between costs, how is that -- guest: it is on the bud -- government budget. but they run a surplus. when they did this, it was a liberal government. the federal government cut the national level of spending. they also pushed a lot of responsibility down to the provinces, because the perception was a work politically more capable of dealing with the problems. in the u.s. they might be more

capable of addressing these difficult problems and we might want to think about that. guest: the government -- host of the government was able to take on the huge expense -- host: the government is able to take on the huge expense and then balance the budget? guest of the canadians make good choices. -- guest: the comedians make good choices. host: coming up next, we turn our attention to the obama administration decision to compromise on the contraception ruling. we will be back with the former the tenant governor of maryland, kathleen kennedy townsend. >> when the president releases his budget plan today, he will propose a program where community colleges and businesses work together to train 2 million workers in high- growth industries. $8 billion will be requested to

fund the partnership. later this month, dr. joe biden and hill the sublease will talk to community colleges, to talk about the program. "politico," reports that max baucus and the house ways and means committee chairman, republican dave camp, met over the weekend to try to reach a deal. several gop aides said that their democratic counterparts were not serious and that senator baucus is being held back by president obama and harry reid. the senate meets today at 2:00 p.m. eastern time. general electric says that it is initiating a big hiring plan involving veterans and expanding its aviation business. general lecture says that the higher our heroes project will help 5000 veterans over the next five years, adding more than 400

new manufacturing jobs. hear the chairman and ceo give his remarks right here on c-span radio. those are the latest headlines from c-span radio. >> shouldn't your president have the highest moral and ethical standards, not as an example to our children and young people in this country? shouldn't his life make you a role model for your for -- future children? should anyone from this office always keep their promises? >> we look back at 14 men that ran for office and lost. go to our website come c- span.org/contenders, to see video of those that had a lasting impact on american politics. >> do they not have the right to protest and revolt against the government that they feel does not serve their interests? who appointed us, trying to

weigh in on the side of a government that perhaps represents 15% of the people of lebanon with little or no apparent support from the other 85%? >> c-span.org/the contenders. >> tonight, on "communicators, the world's largest provider of mobile that works. also, the latest on smart phones with brian deehner. >> "washington journal" continues. host: kathleen kennedy townsend serve as the lieutenant governor of maryland from 1995 to 2003 and is a board member with catholic democrats. welcome to the table.

we appreciate your talking with our viewers. guest: could be with you. host: this ruling over the contraception issue has not died down. we can see it here in the papers this morning from "the wall street journal." let me read this -- guest: my reaction is that it is not an immoral policy, it is part of a long tradition to care for the least among us. to care for the sick. to help those that need help. women, many women want, need, use contraception. as you know, you can use contraception for a number of

issues. to prevent birth, on ovarian cysts, on terrible cramps. it helps to stop and reduce ovarian cancer. there are many reasons that one may want contraceptive devices. the fact that the bishop does not understand that is really unfortunate. the good news, as you know, is that catholic health centers under carol keaton, who says that this is a good idea -- the jesuit colleges say that this is a good idea, and catholic charities have endorsed it. there is disagreement amongst catholics. it is a big church. we do not always agree on everything. host: were you surprised that the bishops did not like a compromise that was put out there? guest: remember, the bishops are largely going to become very

conservative. you do not really hear them speaking about poverty the way that they did when i was young. you do not hear them speaking out about war and peace issues, like you did 20 years ago. you would naturally think that they would be on the side of the republican party. host: this has been part of the debate amongst those running for president. rick santorum when don "meet the press," yesterday. i want to get your reaction. [video clip] >> the bottom line is that you have the federal government saying that we will give you the right, and then saying -- by the way, we will tell you how to exercise that right. we will tell you, a religious and church affiliated group, that what you provide your employees -- if you do not like it, tough. our right to tell you what to do

trump's your deeply held convictions about what you're dollars should be spent for. the idea that you could have an insurance company -- by the way, a large number catholic social service providers are self- insured. they will be forced to still provide. there is no compromise here. they're forcing religious organizations to pay for something that they find as deeply morally wrong. this is not what the government should be doing. guest: obviously, he has not listened to the national catholic -- catholic health association, just a colleges, and catholic charities, all of whom agree with the president. there is a disagreement amongst catholics. rick santorum himself said that states should outlaw contraception. so, he has a different view. 98% of catholic women that use

contraceptive devices have different views from 60% of catholics that indorse the proposals. so, that is a debate and a question. i think that he is really on me -- you know, he has firmly held views, but probably politically they are on the wrong side. republicans want to get it out there and the anti- contraceptive. i think that that is a political mistake of a large dimension on their part. host -- host: everyone knows your family, a prominent catholic family. let me ask you, are you a catholic first or a woman first? guest: i was born both and they are both very important to me. i am as catholic as the pope. it is a big church with many parts to it. catholics have different views from the pope on this matter. and the bishops.

the national catholic health association supports the president. so, that indicates that the bishops do not speak for all catholics. host: let's get to the phone call here. you are on the air with kathleen kennedy. go ahead. caller: thank you for taking my call. my question is, why does it seem like so many men are against women being healthy. it seems like they want to take us back to a time when they had so much control over us, they could tell us what to do with our body. this is 2012. i think i know what is good for me. guest: that is an interesting question. as you know, it is men telling

women what to do. women are saying that we can make decisions ourselves for what is in the best interest of our health. it takes a while for things to change. you understood it very well. women do know what is in their best interest, what is in the best interest for their health. host: john, republican in sarasota, florida. we are talking about republican decision on friday to put out this compromise on the contraception ruled. we want to get your thoughts on all of that. john, go ahead. our guest is kathleen kennedy townsend. caller: now i know why i became a republican in 1980. as far as contraception and birth control pills, the the

catholic church alone. send them to these clinics that give them away. if you -- you come from a large family -- guest: i am the oldest of 11. caller: if the mother said that you did not -- that she did not want a child, she wanted an abortion, you would not be around. guest: we have 11 kids in our family. it is very interesting, you do not want me to be part of the catholic church, and yet the national -- as i have said before -- jesuits agree with it, catholic charities agree with it, and the catholic health association agrees with it. we believe that the catholic church is a large church, which is why it has been able to endure. it has different voices. i am as catholic as the pope.

my cat phallicism is really important to me. deeply important to me. i have gotten enormous solace from teaching at the catholic church. i have learned the importance of caring for the sick, the pork, and the helpless, from my catholic upbringing. i went to catholic school for 10 years. so, i do not want -- i really think it is sad that you want to kick me out. i want to embrace me. i want to have more catholics, as i think it is an important part of our church. host: are the bishops alienating catholics? caller: they speak for -- guest: they speak for one part of the church, but not all the church. my view about the bishops is that they are chosen by rome. they are not elected. although the first catholic bishop in the united states was

elected. i think it is an interesting notion, if there are some reform efforts, the bishops should better represent the people that they work with. that there should be better relationships between the bishops and not just the people up the chain, but what the people think. i think that would be really good. host: we have this twitter message -- guest: a very good point that i should have raised earlier. this has been the rule in 28 states, including our largest states, new york and california. some of our states had very small exceptions that we did not hear about. under the bush and administration, this contraception -- contraceptive was part of the requirements of health plans. none of the bishops complained

at that point, which just leads me to wonder if this has more to do with politics than what is best for women's health. that is what is added up at the end. host: going back to the phone calls, independent line, florida, go ahead. caller: the government being involved in it at all, that is the moral issue. i think it should be lived up -- left up to an independent woman to decide what is best for her, not the government. i do not think that the government would be willing to sacrifice their own people with abortion every day, and i do not think that they should be involved whatsoever. bringing people on this earth just to kill them for us. guest: i think that she may be

complex -- completing a number of things. this is not abortion, it is contraceptives. it prevents pregnancy and helps women with other issues. the idea is that women should make those decisions. this is a woman's decision. a woman should make the best interest -- the decision for what is in her best interest. host: do you see birth control as a moral issue? guest: i think that a woman can decide what she wants. i think that it is helpful to have that right. do i think that the [unintelligible] from the catholic church was right? i do not. i do not agree. as to many catholics. as you know, when it was passed, there was a study group as to whether the church should change their policies on

contraceptions. the vast majority of the people in that study group said that the church should change the policy. for one particular man, pope john paul ii, he said that if we change the policy it would show that the holy spirit was always on the side of the protestants. they did not change the policy because they were interested in their own power. as a result, 98% of american catholics do not pay attention to the bishops on this. and i think that that is harmful in the sense that it is very important for the church to have a moral voice when people do not pay attention to them. politically, i think if they

should make sure that what they say has some credibility. host: let's go to the democratic line, pennsylvania. caller: i am a quaker. i married a catholic in 1963. at the time my mother said that it is not so socially reprehensible any more because there is a catholic in the white house. that is my background. i think that the government and church thing is political. i think that rick santorum is being a demagogue about this. there is another issue that concerns me regarding reproduction. we just had the 7 billion human on earth born? we have too many people, all respect your big family, but your family could afford those children. a lot of people cannot. my daughter, who lives in south

boston, i know this up there because they have health care paid for, all up and down the streets there are all of these double and triple strollers. people are doing that because it is easier than having just one child the old-fashioned way. i do not think that we should be encouraging people to have big families anymore. i will listen to your comment. host: your reaction? guest: i am happy with my 11 brothers and sisters. the 11th of us is a fabulous film producer. she has been nominated for oscars. she just produced a film on my mother. i think that women can decide. i think that there are very many women that would prefer to limit the number of children and use birth control to do that. i think that could be very helpful to them.

if you cannot afford to have 11 children, it is very difficult for you and the kids. as she said, we were lucky. i feel blessed to of come from a large family. host: is there debate within your family? guest: even my mother is with president obama. she understands. she goes to mass every day and she very much appreciate so many priests and nuns the work with the poor, doing god's work. sometimes the bishops are not supportive of that. host: how has your mother's viewpoint evolved over the years? guest: i would have to talk to my mother about that. [laughter] but over the years, i think it is also her friendship with priests, really, a priest to have reworked in the poverty communities.

she has understood how much support the church has given them. guest: i think that was try to get her generation and how that view has changed. host: i think that -- host: i think that i was trying to get at her generation and how that you has changed. guest: well, when i went to school, i had a friend with 17 kids in their family. we were 7 in elementary school. obviously, we came from large catholic families. if i talk to my catholic friends today, they're having three kids, for kids, not 10 kids or 11 kids. host: independent line, austin, texas. guest: good morning -- caller: good morning. thank you for c-span. i wanted to say that the

churches' position on this, with lawsuits against this, is discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender. the people in this lawsuit, are they looking at the insurance rolls of their own companies and churches, to make sure that single men do not get prescribed by agra and other erectile dysfunction drugs? guest: a very good point. there were a number of suits where drug companies were providing of by agra and not contraception. -- viagra and not contraception. women should make the decision about what is best for their own health. host: george, republican, mississippi. caller: i am a catholic and a former monk. guest: no kidding.

host: what kind? caller: [unintelligible] i know that the kennedys contributed quite a bit. guest: i am actually on the board of the monastery. caller: i was there. guest: no kidding. did you know my god father, danny walsh? caller: yes. i did not know him well, but of course you know everybody. guest: he taught theology at the abbey. caller: right. i guess my comment is, the church is not really a democracy. the pope is the only one that matters. my point is, the episcopal church and catholic church were very similar until the 1960's. the episcopal church became very liberal, with women priests and

a homosexual priests, and their membership has thrived drastically. whereas the capital church has remained the same. i think that that stability is important. i hate that they are involved in the government. i would like to say -- like to see them say that they do not need money from the government. i think it is contaminating the church. host: i think we got your point. guest: well, i love the you were a [unintelligible] monk. my family has a close connection to them. as you know, even they had disagreements at times with the pope. father thomas merton had to have his letters looked at by the monks themselves and by the

local bishops. there are many parts to the catholic church, which is why i love about it. we do not all agree, but that is what church is about. host: md., democratic caller. caller: i cannot believe that this is insurance that we are talking about today. i do not believe that it is between or has anything to do with religion. i think that it has to do with the person, the woman between her and her doctor, as well as contraceptives. something that a woman needs to have good health. i think that rick santorum goes overboard. his wife lived with a man that was a senior and started an abortion clinic.

so, he has to overdo it. he has to our right everything on this, overcompensating like travis. when they become -- like drug addicts. when they become clean, they overdo it. when they talk about it. host: what about that separation between church and state? guest: it is a very good question. how do you get any money from federal or state governments? when i was lieutenant governor, we had faith based programming. what we would do -- there were terrific organizations involved in baltimore city. we would give them money, but they could not use the money to proselytize. they could help of hospitals and homeless shelters. they did a terrific job. they could not use it to proselytize.

they set up a separate organization in which they could receive money to do good works. host: what sort of things with a banned from doing? guest: you could not use the money to preach. you could not use the money to become a catholic. you would use the money to help someone with sickness, finding a job, or whenever it was needed. i think that is a very important distinction that helps to keep the line between church and state. over the years, as you know, catholic charities have helped so many people. different hospitals in the united states are run by nuns. you want to make sure that they are kept up and running, because they do such a good job. host: you have mentioned this important voice before.

guest: number one, she was a person who said that the obama health care plan did not support abortion, contrasting what the bishops had said. as a nun, she was able to have the credibility, as a great catholic, tutu nafta -- national health care. she spoke on that and was critical of the original plan that the obama administration had put out. but when she changed the position, she changed as well. she had credibility in the health-care field, as well as as a catholic. when she speaks, she speaks with knowledge and graves a toss. host: did you agree with the original ruling? guest: i did. as some people point out, this is the case in 28 states already. i figure that this has been

going on in 28 states. that we were able to do with them, why not continue? clearly, there was a push back and the obama administration responded very quickly. host of republican line, hawaii. they are up -- host: republican line, hawaii. they are of very early. [laughter] caller: you look so much like your father. i think that your uncle and father would be revolted by this. unfortunately you and many other catholics are toxic. as far as the jesuits are concerned, how can you call jesuits catholics? some jesuits, at least the ones in hawaii, are saying that law is not president -- is not

present in the holy eucharist. caller: i call them guest: there was a time when the jesuits did not like what the church was doing. the point is that the church has many parts. you do not have 1 billion people all thinking the same way on every single issue. that is not why the church is so rich. the churches rich because people have different views on particular issues. you say that is cafeteria catholicism. at least it is catholicism. i think it is important. i welcome what you have to say. i like to listen to you and hear your views. i am sure you feel the same way about me. host: you serve as a board

member of the catholic democrats. iguest: it is an effort to rejet catholics and make sure that the catholic voices heard -- to reach out to catholics. too often it seems that the bishops have gone to the republican side and we want to make it sure that there are many catholics who are democrats and believe very strongly the role of the church that we grew up with taught us to care for the poor, the sick, the homeless, the helpless. matthew, chapter 5, why are you here? you are here to help someone, to help your neighbor, love your god. that means we give something up. my parents often quoted to me when we read the bible every night and said our prayers together, we often heard from

st. luke, from those who have given much but much will be expected. we were very fortunate and had a responsibility to others. host: vermont, richard. caller: hello. how are you doing? i was raised catholic. i am also a pharmacist. you did not respond to the planned parenthood comment where these ladies can go to get oral contraceptives. you accuse the caller saying that he wanted to cast you out of the catholic religion or something, in so many words. guest: it actually it said that. "what are you a catholic?" caller: i do not remember exactly what you said, but the point of trying to make is that

i do not believe that it is wrong to use oral contraception. i was raised catholic, but i respect catholics to do have the religious conviction and a respect the church for their conviction and doctrine. what the president is trying to do is use another giveaway. he is ordering insurance companies to give these medications away for free. let me give you a quick scenario how this can go. host: let me jump in because we are running out of time. guest: yes, it is part of the health-care plan. there are certain services that everyone should get. one of those services is contraception for women. the reason is because it helps

women be healthier. we are interested in making sure that we have a healthy country and healthy women. they should get contraceptive devices. it costs $600 per year and it is expensive for a lot of women who cannot afford it. if it is free, they are more apt to use it and be healthy. as a pharmacist, you want people to be healthy. host: democrat from mobile, alabama. caller: my comment is this. most of the people that are jumping up and down abotu this -- about this rule is men. they do not want contraception coverage for women but they want viagra covered on men. most of them are politicians. 99 percent sent -- 99% of the people rallying against this are

men. host: the think command should be in the debate about this issue? -- do you think men should be able to debate? guest: i think everyone should be able to discuss this. the bishops are all men at making decisions about women. it is a little ironic. when you actually talk to people, they believe women should get contraceptive devices. this is a great debate. i hope the bishops will be able to listen to women. i wrote a book about a policy they were supposed to do about women. one of the reason is because bishops sometimes have a problem

listening. when you get to be a bishop, you talk to people. one of the issues that i think the bishops and the church need to do is listen to women. we have a lot to say. we are people of conscience. we are people of moral views. we are catholic. host: republican from miami. good morning. caller: good morning. this has nothing to do with contraception. it is all about tearing down the constitution. i am catholic. i have used birth control methods in the past. however, i do not expect my church to pay for them. what it boils down to is tearing down everything in the constitution. host: let's take a

constitutionalist you. -- constitutional issue. guest: people whose main purpose is to proselytize are exempted. over 370,000 churches are not covered by this role model. i do not know if that was clear to you. other churches who have the main purpose of teaching or health care, they do not have to pay for it. the church -- the insurance company pays for it. it is much less expensive to cover contraception than to cover what happens if you get pregnant. a pregnancy is much more expensive. this saves money. host: louisville, kentucky, and dependent caller. -- independent caller. caller: you are a wonderful speaker. nuns kept at the mercy of the

missionaries for sex were given the pills and the vatican themselves reported many cases of the nuns forcing to have sex with priests. some of them became pregnant and were encouraged to have abortions. host: where are you going with this? caller: when nuns have access to the pill and even abortions, in the case of rape, and then turn around and deny the same access, even in the case of rape, for medical reasons, too, it's a slap in the face to all women considering the church's own sexual past. guest: many nuns have supported the new ruling by the obama

administration because, i think, many of them work in hospitals and they know how important is to get the services although they, themselves, do not want it provided to themselves. it is difficult. the question between the power of the church and the power of the state is sometimes difficult. what the obama administration is doing a good job is to provide health care for women and also respect the faith of churchgoers. host: 5 minutes left. let me talk 2000 call politics. what will be your role -- 2012 politics? guest: i'm excited in supporting the president. i think he has done a really good job in trying to get health care passed. this was a policy that my uncle,

ted kennedy, worked very hard on. we had one of the biggest economic crises since the great depression. a person on earlier talking about what we can did make sure we have enough jobs in this country and to grow the economy. there is a lot to be discussed in the coming months and will be very important to make sure that we have a great debate as to what is best for our country. host: when you have an official role with the obama campaign? guest: i help them out. host: what is your political future? guest: you hear an announcement from my nephew in the next few weeks in massachusetts. host: running for? guest: congress. he is terrific. his name is joe kennedy. host: you, personally, will you

run again? guest: i'm not planning to. host: next caller, lisa. there you go. caller: how are you today? one of the other callers that called in, and do not see this as a women's right to contraception issue. i see this as a constitutional issue about the bill of rights. we have a first amendment protection of the church to uphold their beliefs. here lately, but i see a lot of our rights being stripped away and people need to be aware. this is not a women's issue. i have been able to get contraception my entire life without any problem whatsoever. it was less expensive when i was younger because the cost of everything has gone up. i have never had a problem

getting contraception. i did not believe that most women have a problem. host: let's take that point, lisa. guest: you every two good points. first, in fact, three are people and people not as well-off as you commit it is expensive. $600 per year is very expensive. the poverty level for a family of four was $12,000. studies will show that people do not use the money to take contraception or use the pill every day to make it effective. when it is free, people are more apt to use it. that is the first point. the second thing about what this is a constitutional question, over 370,000 churches will be exempt from this. they do not have to provide any contraception.

the government does not imposing their view on you. i think the people feel about what is best for women. they are exempt. host: have a of a problem is this for those who work at catholic institution to universities? guest: those who work for places where their primary goal is a vacation or health will be able to get contraception through the insurance, not the university or the hospital. this will not cover them. it will not cover people who work in the parishes. some people think that is very unfortunate, but that is the constitutional line that makes sense. host: that president obama drew on friday. guest: earlier. there are eight states that do not even make this exception. host: 1 lost on call, sylvia, a

democrat in miami. caller: kathleen, it is good to hear a rational catholic voice being brought forward. i was born and raised catholic. i am outraged at the bishops over this issue. i was wondering where the outrage was when the crisis in the catholic church was brought to the port from -- the forefront. guest: it's interesting that the bishops have taken on an issue that does not affect them. what they are upset about is women. it affects not of them personally. that is one of the dialogues that will go forward. it will be a good thing for them to hear about this from so many of their parishioners. host: kathleen kennedy townsend,

thank you for talking to our viewers. coming up, the weekly look at the cost of government. >> break lawmakers have approved a new austerity measures demanded by bailout creditors dissemination from bankruptcy after riots left stores looted and burned and more than 120 people hurt. this paves the way for european partners and the international monetary fund to release new rescue loans. u.s. stock futures are up on the news. the israeli prime ministers accusing iran of being behind a pair of car bombings in indiana and georgia. benjamin netanyahu tells a group of leaders from his party that he believes the iranians were

responsible. two people wounded in india and the bomb in georgia was discovered before it went off. iran is accusing israel in the killing of several scientists involved in their controversial nuclear program. nasa is looking at parking a man out post next to the moon on the way for deep space missions. according to one memo, they're putting together a team to assess the possibilities of a potential location for on the far side of the moon. those are some of the latest headlines on c-span radio. >> should your president had the highest moral and ethical standards and be an example to our children and young people in this country? ask yourself that question, please. should his life may consult a role model for your future children? should anyone you elect to this

office always keep as promises? >> as candidates campaign, we look back at 14 men who ran for the office and loss. it c-span.org/thecontenders to see videos of the contenders. >> do they not have the right to protest against a government that date field does not serve their interests. who appointed just to sacrifice the lives of young americans trying to weigh in on the side of a government that represents perhaps 15% of the people of lebanon and little or no apparent support from the other 85%? ." -- >> c-span.org/thecontenders. >> the fourth in a series at the consumer electronics show in the improving spectrum use.

what is an ultrbook? the latest on smartphones. tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern. host: every monday in the last hour we turn to your money on how taxpayer dollars are spent. we put a focus on your money and different types of federal programs that are out there. today we look at in a report looking at how much it costs states to operate prisons. joining us from new york is michael jacobson, the former corrections commissioner for new york and the current executive director for the very institute of justice. their route with their report for it really goes on to the

running prisons in the state. it can you tell us about this report? guest: everyone had a sense prisons were expensive, but they were more is expensive their people thought. -- than people thought. host: on average, a figure in one of the stories that came after europe or, the annual average taxpayer cost when you look at the cost of prisons is about $31,000 to the taxpayer. does that surprise you? guest: it does not surprise me a lot. i have been working in the field for a long time. it is important that the $31,000 is an average number and there is a great deal of state variation. states in the south like louisiana and kentucky are in

the area of half that cost. then states in the northeast in maine, new york, connecticut, that are significantly more. they are a very expensive proposition to use. host: the reason this is making headlines because there are costs not being calculated by the state. what are some of those costs? guest: it is important to remember that some states to calculate the costs in their prison budget. other states, like new york and others, have a big cost out side of the prison budget that tend to be like prisons and -- pensions, fringe benefits, unfunded liabilities. it depends on how the state has traditionally budgeted those costs. we wanted it to capture all of them to have some kind of on apples to apples comparison. host: unfunded costs to the

retiree health care, that is about $2 billion. is this an average across the state's ts? guest: those are big costs that lay outside the state correction budget. they are not all outside, so you do have the states that i mentioned, especially connecticut, new york, illinois, that have those big costs, our budgeted centrally. we really want the taxpayers to get a sense of the real cost, the real price of operating these huge of the expense of institutions. host: let me put these in dollar figures. new york, $60,000.

these are states with the highest costs per inmate. what does this mean, michael jacobson? what is the solution? guest: it is important to look at the very ability around the country. a lot of them above the average tend to be in the northeast. washington state is the one exception on the west coast. the real intent is not to look at the per prisoner cost and have the state of the public think about how we can make this particular per prisoner costs cheaper, and there are eight key reasons i say that. to run a good, safe, constitutional prison is an expensive proposition. 24 hours, seven day per week facilities with people covering

every possible need including, for the population, a lot of physical and mental health needs. on a per prisoner basis, i do not think there's anything wrong, but the real issue is the bottom line. how much the state and taxpayers need to spend on prisons in full tally? we are of the opinion, and it is not just at vera, that we over- use the prisons and we have people in prison for too long for something that is not a threat to public safety and this is a call to examine that. let's look at how we use the prisons, and let's use this parsimonious league. it is a very expensive, very punitive sanctions. it is perfectly fine to use it for people who require rick, but we should not overuse it. i do not think states with higher than average cost should get to the lower than average

cost, but they do need to look at the bottom line. host: do we know how states are looking at the shortfall? guest: they're doing what they do to make up the shortfall now. it is one of the reasons that we put out this report. while state economies are severely depressed right now and the revenue picture is pretty bleak. states are enacting all sorts of cuts to essential programs. some of them include prisons, but one of the things that is interesting about the field of corrections is that there are a lot of ways to control costs and lower costs while increasing public safety at the same time. that is not true in a lot of fields. you do not lower-cost as you lay off teachers are firefighters, but you can shrink these systems and have more public safety if your victims. we think it's important for states to look at this and a lot of them have been more welcome

to looking at that. host: here is the front page of "usa today." what you think this had mind means for state budgets for prisons? guest: i think there'll be a lot of attention on state budgets generally and prisons specifically. it is one of the reasons we did this. we think shoustates should be looking at the big policy decisions that will really control costs and protect public safety. we do not think states should cut at the margins and cut essential programming that will keep recidivism down. corrections is about 7% on average of state budget spending, so that is a big chunk and it has gone up than -- more than any other function, other

than medicaid. it is time to take eight a -- a look at mid and long-term budgets. there's very little federal money in this. 96% of all dollars going in is state money. state prisons are one of the more pure state taxpayer- supported things. host: from dallas, texas. in texas, this is the average daily inmate population, 154,000. $3.30 million is the taxpayer cost of prisoners and it averages out to be about $21,000

for the average annual cost per inmate. go ahead. caller: i would just like to say that down here, they have people locked up for no reason at all. i think these prisons are privately-owned and that is why they are making money out of just keeping people locked up. they are not trying to rehabilitate people anymore. they just lock them up for money. you know felon's want to get out. then they cannot find a job. then they are back in prison because they have to try to make a living by doing something. host: what about private nurses public prisons? -- private vs. public? guest: most of the privately- owned prisons are in the south and southwest. are they better?

are they cheaper? it's not clear at all they are better or cheaper. one. it does do, however, is that the people who own them lobby very effectively for longer sentences and more prisoners because they get a higher market share. are they a real player in this field? for me, they are one obstacle to reform, actually, because it is one of the reasons that the prisons keep going. the other point she made is that we do have people in prison, especially low-level offenders who have a very high recidivism rate. what they mean by that is more than half of everyone who comes out of a state prison is back in in four years. that is a high and costs the recidivism rate that is not good for finances or public safety. it is one of the reasons we think state policy makers and the public really need to shine the light on reforming the systems. host: here is something from

the justice center about reentry facts. tell me about the cost, michael jacobson. do you have a dollar figure to put by that? guest: i can tell you for the $40 or $50 billion that we spend on prisons, but a huge chunk of that in some states, sometimes half, are for the people who have already been at the prison and are coming back which is why

the recidivism rate of over 50% is a huge problem, not only for public safety, which is why one reason states are putting more and more money into prevention, after care, and reentry. it drives up the cost of state prisons, so finding a way to target investments and lower the recidivism rate will result in huge taxpayer dollar savings and, if you do it to get -- do it safely come you get your victims. host: the next call comes from michigan. the average daily inmate population as low to compared we saw in texas. the taxpayer cost is about $1.30 billion and the average annual cost per inmate is about $28,000. from michigan, what is your question or comment? caller: i used to be parole officer in the state of idaho and i did my internship with the

department of corrections in washington state. a more practical way for getting people to look at this is to put more money into their budgets and other education budgets. it has a lot to do with the fact that there are a lot of law enforcement unions that put pressure on the state legislatures and there are no reentry programs for these people. a lot of these people come from extremely dysfunctional backgrounds, their segregated from society, and then they are tossed back into the street, or swim. host: do unions play a role in the cost of how much are state spending? guest: absolutely. it's the same dynamic of the privately owned prisons. the most well-known one is the

ccpoa. there are a lot of very powerful corrections unions and a lot of them have lobbied for, not only better benefits, but these are very hard jobs and they deserve these benefits for the hard work, they have lobbied for more it tough on crime laws because the result in more jobs. i think that is changing a little bit as the labor issues become less around expanding prisons and more around individual benefit and especially lowering violence in overcrowded facilities. that's a big issue, even more than trying to expand. a lot of these unions have the sense that states will take a look at this function to try and reduce costs and intelligently to reduce the overall size of their systems, but historically there's no question that powerful employee unions are one of the factors about why prisons

have brown. -- have grown. host: michael jacobson, here is a tweet. can you talk about county jail versus state prisons? guest: louisiana sounds the highest percentage of their state prisoners to county jail. there are a few problems with that. it is probably cheaper, as the tweeter said, but they are not meant to house on long term state prisoners. they may be closer to their families, but in general they do not have the mental and physical health programs that prisoners need. it is not good correction's policy. it may be cheaper, but my bet is

that they're probably not as well run and it would be interesting to know what the recidivism rate is for the people who leave those facilities. it's a way to keep costs down in the short term. long term, a bad it is not. host: the average cost per inmate in new york as $60,000. democratic caller. caller: how are you doing? if there is one thing i cannot stand it is hypocrisy. there is nothing that makes me more ashamed to be an american than this do come out hypocritical drug war which has glutted our prisons with addicts. if the attic commits a crime and goes to prison. if he steals something to support his habit, send him to prison, but we have a lot of users and addicts that should not be in the system. thank god for ron paul. i'm a democrat but i would vote

for him in a minute because he wants to legalize. if you do not understand, america, that this is just a replay of prohibition, you are stupid hypocrite. host: michael jacobson, let me ask you this. is there a less expensive prison term -- prisoner? does it depend on the crime they are in for, the age, or the gender? guest: again, if you have high levels of drug use and mental health issues, the costs are more because it costs more to deal with those problems. once they are in prison, they're responsible for all your needs. the sector you are, the more you cost. everyone is more expensive. some are more expensive than

others. the caller's point though, and there were a number of them, but one of them is that it is true that the number of drug users in prison, but drug possessors or low-level dealers has increased dramatically, probably by about 500,000 people over the last 50-20 years. one thing about the population in general is that there what criminologists call a one-for- one replacement effect. when you put a low-level seller or user in prison, someone else will be on the street corner selling drugs. we know it does not deter people from using drugs. that is one of the type of people that the states really need to look at. it's not like you can ignore them. there are public health concerns and say concerns, but in the end, you want to deal with their addiction issues and all sorts

of research has shown that when the people come out of prison they go back to prison in huge numbers. there are other things you need to do other than put huge numbers of low-level users in prison. big-time dealers? yes. kingpins? obviously. the people liturgist using drugs, we need to deal with the issue but we know that prison is not a successful response for that. host: michael jacobson, and get your response to this headline in "the new york times." the number the older inmates increased by 63% in the number of all increased by .7%. what does this impact on cost?

guest: it's huge. some states have what are, essentially, geriatric prisons and it is because of the all "tough on crime" life sentences and now we hold people for most of their lives exactly during the time when they're not a threat to public safety at all. once it did become even before 50, but certainly that, your days in the aggregate of committing private crimes are over. we have huge numbers of people in prisons you are not a threat to public safety who were very expensive to maintain because they have held issues. it's a growing problem because prisoners will just keep getting older and they are one of the categories that are more costly but that the average prisoner. it's a huge problem for states and one of the impacts of passing tough on crime legislation, most of which sounds good and intuitive, but a lot of it, like this, has huge

unintended consequences, not just social, but with taxpayers. host: $22,000 in the state of maryland per inmate. next caller. caller: in my opinion, the prison system is inhumane. put a member of our family in there and all 7 billion people are a member of my family from adam and eve. god knows how many people in the prison worldwide and tell them that society does not want him or that they're punishing them, a goes to show how this is in our veins.

we do not view them as peaceful. we view them as untouchables like a case system. -- caste system. host: democrat in philadelphia. what is your take? caller: i just want to bring up the fact but one of the other callers it took the wind out of my sails. i have a young son who came back from afghanistan with a heroin addiction. in the short time he was home, he would go buy some drugs and get sent to prison. he spent three years in prison. i just want to point out the fact -- excuse me -- but a lot of the men and women are coming back with these addictions.

we need more counseling and more help. host: michael jacobson, a tweet for you. guest: an excellent question. you would think so given the number people that we imprison. i think the figures are that we have by% of the world's total population but 25% of the world's prisoners. there are a lot of reasons for this. through the mid-1960s's, a crime was not a political issue. it was one of the issues that was left to experts to deal with. it was regarded as a complex social problem and not want to be politicized. that changed it through the 1970's and both parties found you could make a huge amounts of political capital by being tough

on crime and calling for longer and longer sentences, mandatory imprisonment, and when you add all of these efforts up over the years, here is what you get -- ive countrycarcerates with a recidivism rate of over 50%. these are policy choices that we have made. it is obvious. everyone knows someone who has been a victim of a violent crime. there are some people you need to be a wave from society while hopefully we try to make them better, but by no possible account does any expert on this thing 22.4 million people behind bars. host: we're talking about the state funding of prisons with michael jacobson, executive director of the vera institute

of justice. republican from syracuse, new york. go ahead. caller: i work in prison. i have a close relative in prison. i have insight into what works at least in this state. many of the things you mentioned, i would agree with. one drug user has a huge it impact on a community and it must be failed after the diversion programs have failed. host: i want to get your take on that, the effect of one drug user in a community. guest: its of the important point and then not suggesting we do not deal with them.

for a lot of programs initially, the ones that are an alternative to incarceration that are drug treatment programs, mental health and counseling, supervision, and he's right. if someone cannot follow the rules of that once they're given that chance, then they need to get further sanctions which might include going back to prison. defaulting to prison and using it right from the get go, we know that does not work in the aggregate because all you talk to do is look at figures. it's true that you want to do with people who have drug issues, for their own public health and for the ones who commit crimes for public safety. the real issue is what do you do it first? what is the first line of defense? from ineffectiveness standpoint, it is not present, although it might ultimately end up there. host: in ohio, they have an

average daily inmate population of 151,000 and the cost per taxpayer is $26,000. next caller from ohio. caller: mr. jacobson, i am curious if you can elaborate on the privatization. privatized facilities are still taxpayer-funded. in ohio, at one point in time, we had state liquor stores and privatize them and now you can go in in your supermarket and purchase liquor there. you are selling a product. when it comes to incarcerating prisoners, they are not making a product and making a prisoner self sustaining in terms of cost, not that i want that because it borders on slavery. it is not really private in the privatization. when you look at the states with the most amount of inmates incarcerated, and you mentioned

texas, do they have the most number of private prisons? i testified in front of the legislature of about 15 years ago on the privatization issue and my concern was what kind of the system are rebuilding where you are making a profit motive through taxpayer money and then the people who are making the proper using that money to lobby the politicians for longer sentences, new crimes for incarceration? it's a vicious cycle. can you please elaborate data on little bit more? thank you. guest: i'm happy to. i do not know if texas has the most, but they might. new mexico has the highest percentage of people in the private prisons. you are absolutely right about the cost of private prisons.

whether it is public or private, taxpayer dollars pick up the bill. taxpayers are told by states that use the private prisons that they are cheaper. i do not know if that is true, and one of the biggest issues in the private prisons, and this is it a philosophical issue, is that should corrections be privatized? when you run a prison, you are responsible for every aspect of that person's life and you have the ability to use lethal and deadly force. that's a huge amount of state power to be put in the hands of private industry. it is a huge responsibility that comes at a cost. whatever the cost is, a lot of the profit goes into the people trying to get more private prisons so it is a cycle. whether a state uses public or private prisons, or both, all

the costs are reflected in the costs that you see. host: to his point that a private prison is still public money? guest: absolutely. the costs are going over now, whether a state runs public and/or private prisons, it is all wound up in the taxpayer cost of prisons. that is why they are folded in. from a taxpayer point of view, whether it is public or private, the money still comes out of your pocketbook. host: democratic caller from new york city. caller: a disk when it to touch on punishment verses rehabilitation. -- i just wanted to touch on this. i think we use prisons to punish people and people want that. they feel like it is justice against the person who wronged them. like the person who said

earlier, we let people out, they cannot get a job, no one wants them to live near them, and they were back to their old ways because they cannot make their way in the world which is why recidivism is so high. we put a brand on them that says, "you are a failure," and we label them a criminal. host: you talk about the cost of reentry, but your report also look set sentencing and release policies in order to curb costs. what are some of the ways states are looking at? what did you find from your institute? guest: we found a lot of states are re-examining many of their sentencing laws. it also looks at the length of stay. you are in prison for two years

or two years and two months, the extra marginal amount that you are in is really nothing gained. does not increase public safety, just costs. states are released and intellect all low-level offenders and minimizing the amount of time they spend in prison even with alternative incarceration programs or by having them spend less time in prison but better time. when i say better time, a prison needs to be more than just punishment. it is of course it punishment. for people who have been in prison or work in prison, if you are there, you are being punished. it's an opportunity to provide some mental health, physical health, and certainly rehabilitation programs. as politically unpopular that may sound, you do not want these people to come back. if they come back, it means they probably did something bad and

you spend more money on them. states are getting that on the reentry and entry point of view of having to spend more money wisely. that may mean lowering of the amount of time people spend, and diverting people, but concentrating on why people are there in the first place. we see state after state, especially on low double drug offenders, rethinking sentencing policies and diverting the money they save backend programs we know work better. host: off of twitter -- guest: correct. crime has been going down and it has been for a number of years now. it is one reason why states really should try to look at spending their money more wisely.

we know why crime is down or some of the things that have driven down crime, but one thing we do know in terms of crime reduction is that marginally increasing the size of these state prison systems, because they are so big already, but it gets you next to nothing in terms of increased public safety. they work much better from inside and outside criminal- justice. if that is true, why spend money on something that is not as effective when you could spend it on something that is more effective. if i could just talk about new york for a minute because it is an interesting case study. despite the fact that it has a high per prisoner cost, it is the fastest shrinking prison system. the state has saved hundreds of millions of dollars as a result. new york state leave the country -- leads in crime decline.

it is clear from the new york example that you can drive down the size of your current prison system. host: in colorado, 600,000 and comes down to a cost per inmate of about $30,000. caller: thank you for taking my call. in this country, we have a very perverted chance of liberty versus justice. a perfect example is the war on drugs. people that are drug addicts hurt themselves by being a drug addict. i do not think it is right to put someone in a cage for

hurting themselves. i'm not advocating the legalization or anything like that that often comes with drug use, but for alcohol and cigarettes to be legal, it kills people, and then marijuana is not legal? i just do not think it is fair to draw the line between what should and should not be allowed. host: james is a republican in georgia. caller: the guy said that they should let people out of prison early with medical problems. if you let it person out with medical problems, then they have to go on social security or medicare. the second comment i have is that i am an ex prisoner that changed his life through faith-

based programs. the state of georgia uses face- based programs because you can turn your life over into the care of god. host: were those programs during your time in prison? caller: yes. host: how much resources or time was put the words that? how much time did you spend in the face-based programs stocks -- faith-based programs? caller: i'm still involved. i go to a.a. meetings and church. host: how much of your day was set aside for these programs? caller: the basic training was maybe one hour per day. then you had to practice it. you have to learn to do this the rest of your life. host: any studies looking at

faith-based programs? guest: they are usually important part of the program and rehabilitation that i was talking about. congratulations to the caller three using them to turn his life around. for some prisoners, it may be that. for others, and counseling programs, for others, literacy. the thing is you need programs that people can use to latch onto that have not had before as a way, not just to get through the prison sentence, but as a way to get something use the lot of that time and not come back. that's the goal, to get you to not come back to prison. it is hugely important, not just in prison, but there is a big faith-based programs on reentry,

but whether they are faith based or not, the essential ingredient in programs that work that are well targeted, well-designed that deal with very specific issues that people have the amount they can be faith based or not but the key is to have those programs available. it is not coddling or a waste of money. it's a good, solid investment for programs that work. host: last phone call. democrat from germantown, maryland. caller: i work for the d.c. department of corrections -- yes, i worked for the d.c. department of corrections for 28 years. host: turn the television down. sorry. i will have to leave it there. michael jacobson, as we wrap up, people can find the report on

vera.org. have you received a feedback from states and those who run the prisons? guest: we are getting good feedback from the state. this is not a secret. some states are calling to refine one or two of their numbers. but states get that this does reflect the real cost and it is a useful measure in a useful way to look at costs. we have only gotten positive feedback both from the field of corrections and also from the public. prison is very expensive, a very punitive sanctions. we really have to be careful with how we use it and how we spend the taxpayers' dollars. i think most states appreciate that this is a way to further that discussion and reform. host: michael jacobson, executive director of vera

institute. thank you for your time this morning. guest: thank you for having me. host: that does it for today's "washington journal." we will be back tomorrow at 7:00 a.m. with your calls and comments. thank you for watching today. see you tomorrow. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> president obama unveils his fi