because there is such misconception here, but categorical eligibility makes it easier for poor people, those who are already approved for other low-income assistance programs to receive snap benefits. but it also makes it easier on the state to have to administer these programs. this saves time and money and paperwork because the people who are already eligible for similarly administered benefits to not have to reapply for snap and states do not have to waste hours processing paperwork for people already eligible based on incomes. it does not mean that people who don't qualify -- who don't qualify for snap get those benefits. to the contrary people still have to qualify for the program to receive food, any claim this is a fraudulent practice or ripe with abuse is just another falsehood and smear against one of the most efficient federal programs, the demonization of snap and other food and nutrition programs by republican friends it must come to an end.

we have an obligation in this country to provide a circle of protection for the most vulnerable. cutting $36 billion means that more than 22 million households will see a cut in their benefit, this means 22 million families will have less food tomorrow than they do today. . two million people will be cut from the snap program altogether. my friends on the other side of the aisle don't like to hear this but sometimes the truth hurts. if this bill before us becomes law, it will take food out of the mouths of children in america. all in the name of protecting tax cuts for wealthy and increase pentagon spending. the republican reconciliation bill threatens medicare, it threatens children's programs, it threatens educational programs, programs that support our infrastructure. in short, if this were to be adopted into law it will threaten our economy as a whole.

and the bill not only protects the pentagon budget, it increases it by billions of dollars. does anyone here honestly believe that there's not a single dollar to be saved anywhere in the pentagon? if you do you're not read be the newspapers. it's there in front of us every single day. the abuse that goes on. no mid defense contract. i can go on and on and on. we will continue to have the strongest military in the face of the earth, but at some point national security must mean more than throwing billions of dollars at unnecessary nuclear weapons or a pie in the sky star wars program that will never materialize, but national security has to mean taking care of our own people. it means educating our children. it means that infrastructure that isn't crumbling around us. it means clean air and clean water and a health care system that works. those should be our priorities, but sadly those are not the priorities in the bill before us today. now, of course, senator reid says the bill is dead in the water in the senate and the

press conference yesterday, the senate majority leader said, and i quote, as long as republicans consider a more reasonable approach, one that asks every american to pay their fair share, the sequester is the only path forward, end quote. that's a pretty clear statement that the senate will not consider this bill. quite frankly, it's the right thing to do. a reasonable approach is what the american people want. yes, they want it to get our fiscal house in order. they want us to reduce the deficit in a fairway so the wealthiest among us pay their fair share. but mostly the american people want jobs, something that house republicans leadership continues to ignore. the american people know the best way to bring this deficit down is through job creation. they want the economy to improve. they want their lives to get better. this bill does not do that. mr. speaker, let me concloud by quoting president dwight eisen hire in a speech he made in 1953. i quote, every gun that is made, every war ship launched

signals a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed, end quote. i'm afraid, mr. speaker, that president eisenhower wouldn't recognize today's republican party. we should reject this closed rule and the underlying bill and i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from massachusetts reserves. the gentleman from georgia is recognized. mr. woodall: thank you, mr. speaker. i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. woodall: to say to my good friend as the republican budget chairman said to him yesterday, i appreciate his passion on this issue. what brings us to the very best decision that we can make in this body, mr. speaker, is having folks who work hard day in and day out, educating themselves on the issues. they can bring the very best case for the american people to the floor. and that's why i would ask my friend whether or not he believes it actually helps that debate to get involved in some of those rhetorical feats of

mind, i guess we'd call him, because he knows as well as i know under the law of the land in 2002 food stamp benefits, snap benefits would have gone up about 40% over the last 10 years. and democrats and republicans came together over the last decade and increased those benefits 270%. 270%, mr. speaker. now, this proposal suggests that instead of going up 270% we allow those benefits to go up 260%. that's the draconian cut. i mean, we see that in the same rhetoric in the student loan program, mr. speaker. everyone in this body knows the law of the land was the student loans rate at 6.8%. a below market rate of 6.8%. they were lowered for a very small fraction of the student population for a very temporary period of time to 3 kp 4% and

the law has it back to 6.8%. they talk about that as a doubling instead of returning to common law. and, mr. speaker, to continue to suggest as he knows is not the case that republicans are unwilling to focus on the defense department, let me say it plainly. i believe there is waste and fraud and abuse in the defense department and i stand here willing to work with you to eradicate it all. i supported ranking member van hollen's amendment to put defense on the table. the budget that this house passed, the only budget that's passed in all of washington, d.c., reduced defense spending by $300 billion in recognition of exactly that. and, mr. speaker, again, the rhetoric just gets a little overheated from time to time. candidly i think it gets in the way of us doing business. when i say to you that

secretary of defense, leon panetta, on august 4, 2011, if these defense cuts happen, and god willing that's not the case, but if it would happen, it would result in a further round, because we already cut once. in fact, we cut twice. a further round of a dangerous across-the-board defense cuts that i believe, leon panetta, secretary of defense, would do real damage to our security, our troops and their families. i would say to my friend, how does it advantage us to make this a republican-democratic issue, when the democratic issue of the -- when the secretary of defense said this would be hurtful to our troops and their families? how does this make a democrats and republican issue when leon panetta, the o.m.b. director, said this would be dangerous across-the-board cuts to troops

and their families? when president clinton's chief of staff, leon panetta, former o.m.b. director, former budget committee chairman, says i believe allowing these cuts to go forward would do real damage to our security, to our troops and to our families. do we have real choices to make? i do. mr. mcgovern: if the gentleman will yield? mr. woodall: i would yield. mr. van hollen: the democrats have a substitute amendment that would replace the sequester in a different way. it would prevent the across-the-board cuts from happening to defense and the nondefense programs. so there's an agreement that that meat ax approach is the wrong way. we have an alternative. the gentleman just talked about how we have this great debate on ideas on the floor of the house. i have a simple question, why aren't we going to get an up or down vote on our idea, on how we would replace the sequester in a balanced way?

mr. woodall: reclaiming my time and i thank the gentleman for his commepts and his offering of that substitute. the reason is three-fold. number one, that substitute doesn't comply with the rules of the house. we made a decision in this body that we were going to not continue to ask for more and more and more out of taxpayers' pockets but that we were going to try to do our own business here in terms of oversight on all of the money that's already being borrowed and spent and sent out the two. number two, that is the rules we adopted in this congress, mr. speaker. but under the rules adopted in the last congress in which you were the budget chairman, you know your substitute would also not have been in order under the pay-go rules that you instituted. under a republican house, the substitute is not in order. and under a democratic house the substitute would not have been in order. but number three, and i would argue most importantly, i would is a toy -- i would say to my friend, we have a trust deficit with the american people. it doesn't surprise me. when we talk about the five-year impact of the

reconciliation plan that we passed out of our budget committee and i hope this house will pass today, we're talking about a net effect on deficit reduction, the process for which reconciliation was created of $65 billion over five years. over the next five years, $65 billion is not going to have to be borrowed from our children and our grandchildren. under the gentleman's substitute, over that same period of time, spending is actually going to go up by almost $37 billion. this is a process that is designed to reduce borrowing and spending, to reduce the burden we're placing on our children and the gentleman's substitute increases the burden that we'd place on our children. mr. van hollen: if the gentleman will yield? i don't want to take up all your time. mr. woodall: i will. mr. van hollen: i want to make our point that what our substitute does is dollar for dollar replaces the sequester, which is what our republican colleagues have said is the object of this effort which is to make sure we don't have the meat ax approach and i would

just note that the gentleman said that one of the reasons we're not fg to have an opportunity to -- going to have an opportunity to vote on ours is it doesn't comply with the rules. in bringing the republican bill to the floor today, i'm reading right here on the report, the committee report, you waived three rules. you waived three rules. and yet you can't allow an up or down vote on a substitute amendment. you know -- you know you have it within the power to allow our side -- mr. woodall: reclaiming my time. i would say what we have within our powers, the power to stop the borrowing and the spending. i'm reading here from today's "congressional quarterly" because folks get confused and we talk about the reading clerk and things gets confused. reading from "congressional quarterly" it says here democrats left open a responsibility through a motion to recommit which is allowed under the rule. my friend on the rules committee knows that to be true. my friend on the budget committee knows that to be

true. i look forward to bring your substitute to the floor for a vote. i think that's the right of the minority. i'm glad we preserved the right of the minority, mr. speaker. with that i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia reserves. the gentleman from massachusetts is recognized. mr. mcgovern: i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. mcgovern: just to re-emphasize the point that mr. van hollen made. you know, the rules committee has the right to be able to waive the rules to bring any piece of legislation to the floor. and mr. value holen rightly pointed -- van hollen rightly pointed out in the report on this rule, the republicans implemented waivers because their proposal without these waivers would violate the rules. and so, you know, my friend talks about, you know, this shouldn't be a partisan discussion. i would just say to my friend, the reason why this is a partisan discussion is because the republicans have made it such. by denying us the right to come to the floor and offer our substitute, not as a procedural

matter, but as a real substitute. you have politicized this debate. you have shut us out and that is why there is frustration. i just want to say one other thing, again, because i am so sick and tired of the demonization of programs that benefit poor people in this country, especially the snap program. my friend was talking about all this money that we invested in snap as if somehow we were giving these very generous benefits out. just for the record, in 2002, the average snap benefit was $1 per meal per day per person. $1. you know, with all the improvements we have made, today it's about $1.50 per meal per day. and it's going to go down next year because of cutbacks we already made in this program, unfortunately, to offset other things over the past few years. but that means in a 10-year period that we have increased

this benefit by 50 cents per meal. i don't know about my friend but, you know, $1.50 doesn't go very far today. so what we're talking about trying to help people get through this economic crisis, that's what we're talking about. so this is not some extraffic get, overly generous benefit. that's what it is. and rather than cutting waste in the pentagon budget, which we all know exists, you protect the pentagon budget. you know, rather than going after subsidies for oil companies and going after, you know, billionaire tax breaks, you protect all that. and where do you go to find the savings, programs that help the poorest of the poor. i mean, it's outrageous. mr. speaker, at this point i'd like to yield three mint to the gentleman from maryland, the ranking member of the budget committee, mr. van hollen. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from maryland is recognized for three minutes. mr. van hollen: thank you, mr. speaker. i thank my colleague from massachusetts and thank him for

his leadership on efforts to ensure that those families who are struggling most in our country continue to have access to food and nutrition and that children in our country continue to have access to health care and that's what this debate is all about because we do have an alternative. there's no disagreement on two things. number one, we need to reduce our deficit in this country in a credible way. number two, the meat ax approach to the sequester is not a smart way to do it. so how should we go about reducing our deficit? well, we proposed to do it in the same balanced way that every bipartisan commission that has looked at this issue has recommended, through a combination of difficult cuts, and i would remind everybody that just last august we cut $1 trillion through a combination of cuts as well as cuts to tax

breaks for special interests and by asking the wealthiest people in this country, people making $1 million a year, to contribute a little bit more toward deficit reduction. . mr. woodall: would my friend yield? mr. van hollen: yes. mr. woodall: it raises $3 in taxes versus the spending cuts. can you tell me -- mr. van hollen: i'm glad the gentleman asked the question. simpson-bowles, they proposed an approach which was about $3 in cuts to $1 in revenue depending on the accounting rules. we already enacted $1 trillion in cuts. 100% in cuts. you voted for that, i voted for that, 100% cuts. what this does is for the next one year we do another $30

billion in cuts, a little over, and $80 billion through closing loopholes. for example, we say the big oil companies don't need taxpayer subsidies to encourage them to drill. they have already testified, their chief executives, they don't need that. they are making plenty right now. we also say that millionaires should pay the same effective tax rate as the people who work for them. and if you take that approach, frankly with $1 trillion in cuts we have already made, we are still cutting a lot more than the bipartisan groups recommended compared to the revenue. so our ratio of cuts to revenue is much higher because those bipartisan groups, they recommended that $1 trillion in cuts. we adopted that on a bipartisan basis. what they are not doing, what you're not doing is taking the other part of their recommendation, frakely -- frankly, which is to say let's close some of these outrageous tax loopholes for the purpose of deficit reduction.

and because 98% of our house republican colleagues are signing this pledge saying they won't take one penny of additional revenue -- mr. mcgotsche: an additional two minutes. mr. van hollen: you won't ask one penny more for people making over $1 million a year to help us reduce our deficit. not one penny. the math is pretty simple after that. because you ask nothing of them, your budget whacks everyone else. that's why your budget ends the medicare guarantee. that's why you cut $800 billion out of medicaid. and that's why in your see quester -- sequester program here, you whack the programs that help the most vulnerable struggling families. let's talk about what the nonpartisan congressional budget office said about what your proposal would do. 22 million households with children would see their food and nutrition support cut under the snap reductions. 300,000 kids will no longer get

the school lunch program. 300,000 kids will lose their health coverage under the children's health insurance program. those are the decisions you have to make because? you don't want to ask the oil companies to give up their taxpayer subsidy. we say, the american people would make a different choice, we have that different choice in the substitute amendment. that substitute amendment would prevent those cuts to the defense department, would prevent cuts to n.i.h. and biomedical research, but it would prevent those cuts without whacking seniors and children's health programs. it would do it in a balanced way. we say we don't need the direct payments to agricultural businesses. these are payments that go to ag businesses whether they are making money or not. the spigots on. we cut those. you don't in your proposal before us today. why not? instead, you cut the food and nutrition programs. so, we think the right approach

is the balanced approach that every bipartisan group that's gotten together has recommended. and because 98% of our republican colleagues have signed this pledge saying they are not going to ask the folks at the very top to put in one penny, one dime more, you are smacking everybody else. we don't think that's the right way to go. we agree we should reduce the deficit and we reduced -- we eliminate the sequester but just in a different way. thank you, mr. speaker. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from massachusetts reserves. the gentleman from georgia is recognized. mr. woodall: mr. speaker, i yield myself 30 seconds to say we just disagree on what balance is. what our proposal for brucks is to reduce spending over $65 billion over five years. and your proposal is to spend an additional $35 billion over the same five years. we disagree what balance is. we are moving in the wrong direction under your proposal. right under our proposal i a-- i'm proud to serve with my friend. with that, mr. speaker, i'd like to yield three minutes to the

gentlelady from michigan, mrs. miller. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady from michigan is recognized for three minutes. mrs. miller: i thank the gentleman for yielding. i rise to support the rule. mr. speaker, i am very proud to represent the guard base home to the michigan red devils, the 107 fighter squadron. the 107, mr. speaker, flies a-10's. they recently returned from a redeployment to afghanistan where they performed so bravely, made us proud. the 107th was one of the air guard units scheduled to be eliminated under the president's budget proposal. fortunately, the house armed services committee will present a defense re-authorization bill here next week which resources that and saves the 107th, along with protecting the air national guard across the entire country. this house is going to do the right thing for the great american patriots of the air national guard by prioritizing spending within our budget. not by spending more money. so i would certainly urge our cloogs in -- colleagues in the senate to join us. and, mr. speaker, we need to remember that the cuts that

caused the obama administration to target the air guard were before the sequester, before the sequester. if the sequester is allowed to go into effect, the impact on the community that i represent, for example, would be immense. and the defense corridor we are building as part of our economic revitalization would be stopped dead in its track. not only would the national guard again be put at risk of massive new cuts, but military contracting across the board would be faced with additional cuts. in mccomb county alone, a county i'm proud to represent, this would mean $200 million in additional cuts, mr. speaker. and obviously would count -- cost countless jobs in the defense related corridor. this house has taken steps to stop the devastation of our air national guard and now it's taking steps to stop the deaf significance of our defense base and needless loss of jobs with commonsense reforms. so i would urge all of my

colleagues to join me in reconciliation today in the defense re-authorization bill coming to the floor next week. i yield back my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady yields back. the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. mcgovern: at this time i'm proud to yield to the gentlewoman from connecticut, ms. delauro. five minutes. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady from connecticut is recognized for five minutes. ms. delauro: mr. speaker, i rise in strong opposition to this bill which chooses to slash programs that help struggling families get whack on -- back on their feet without closing a single tax loophole or limiting a single special interest subsidy. our bunt -- budget should reflect our values even as many in the faith community have argued, it should advance the moral responsibilities of the nation to provide for the common good. i note that the catholic bishops just sent a letter concluding that, and i quote, the proposed

cuts to programs in the republican budget reconciliation fail the basic moral test, end quote. i'm pleased that the bishops are speaking out, as he they should. 40% of the total cuts here come from cutting assistance to low and moderate income families, including food stamps, medicaid, the children's health insurance program, social services for vulnerable children and elderly and disabled people. but instead of eliminating the agricultural subsidies where people don't have to plant a seed and they get paid, this budget would cause more than 200,000 children to lose their school lunch. would cut the food stamp program by $36 billion. that means 46 million americans, one half of whom our children would see their benefits cut and two million americans would lose them entirely. this at a time when one in seven

seniors faces the threat of hunger, and one in five children right here in america a land of plenty face a similar risk. they are going to bed hungry in the united states of america. we know the impact of hunger and malnutrition. lower performances at school, poor growth, an immune system less able to fend off illness. instead of ending subsidies to big oil companies, this budget eliminates the social services block grant which provides childcare assistance to low income working mothers, addresses child abuse, provides care for the elderly and disabled. about 22 million people, half of them children, will lose services. instead of ending tax breaks that allow corporations to ship jobs overseas, this budget cuts medicaid, slashes the children's health insurance program, forces 350,000 americans to forego health care coverage provided by health care reform. instead of asking millionaires to pay the same tax rates as middle class families, this budget makes children who are u.s. citizens but immigrant parents ineligible for the child

tax credit, harming two million families and 4.5 million children who are united states citizens. they end the medicare guarantee for seniors in this nation. these cuts have a catastrophic effect on the most vulnerable in our nation and for what? all to protect special interest subsidies, tax breaks for the richest members of our society. by friends it's $150,000 for the average millionaire in a tax cut. that's what we are talking about in this piece of legislation. it is wrong. budgets are about choices, values, and this bill exposes exactly what this majority is all about. we need to pass legislation that strengthens, rebuilds the middle class of this country, creates jobs, invests in rebuilding our infrastructure, supports manufacturers, and supports fairness to our tax code. this reverse robin hood agenda of the house majority fails in every single regard and i urge

my colleagues to oppose it. yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady from connecticut yields back. the gentleman from massachusetts reserves. the gentleman from georgia is recognized. mr. woodall: thank you, mr. speaker. when i hear my colleagues talk, it sounds as if we have a choice about doing one thing or another thing. and i will say to my colleagues, when you are borrowing $1.4 trillion a year from your children -- just a moment. i will be happy to yield to my friend. when you are borrowing $1.4 trillion a year from your children, when you are mortgaging the future of this country, it's not a choice of either spending cuts or revenue changes. we got to have both. we've got to have both. and to describe it to the american people as if we can do one or the other and get ourselves out of this mess, we cannot. we absolutely cannot. i would ask my friends, and i would be happy to yield to my colleague, when this house brought to the floor a tax cut

bill that gave every member of congress a tax cut at the end ever 2011, they said we don't have to pay -- we only have to pay 4% of payroll taxes instead of 6%, i voted no. i said there is not a member in this body that needs a tax cut. i said we have too big a problem in this nation to give tax cuts to members of congress. i voted no. did anybody else vote no with me? did anybody else vote no with me? i will not be lectured about how it is that tax cuts are distributed in this country when we have opportunities to cut them on this floor, to eliminate them on this floor, and my colleagues continue to vote yes. we could have added a provision that eliminated those tax cuts for the rich. we did not and should have. i would be happy to yield. ms. delauro: i thank the gentleman for yielding. the fact of the matter is there are choices and the majority refuses to make those choices. let us cut. let us cut the taxes for people who -- let's not provide the tax cuts for people who are making

over $250,000 in this nation. let us come back from afghanistan in an orderly way. mr. woodall: thank you very much. ms. delauro: let us cut the agriculture subsidies. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady will suspend. the gentlelady will suspend. the gentleman from georgia has the time. mr. woodall: i thank the speaker for his help there. i'm sorry i needed it, but i appreciate him offering it. we passed a budget in this house. a comprehensive budget in this house. and to hear my colleagues talk, you'd think this is the only bill we are going to pass for the rest of the year. to hear my colleagues talk you think we are not going to bring a farm bill to the floor and go after ag subsidies. to hear my colleagues talk you think we are not going to bring a tax bill to the floor and try to raise revenues in this country. to hear my colleagues talk, this is it. this isn't it. this is the bill that responds to the chairman joints chief of

staff, general martin democracy, who said this year about the cuts we are trying to prevent today, i will tell you that i am prepared to say that sequestration will pose an unacceptable risk. that's what we are here to talk about today. how do we mitigate an unacceptable risk. how do we mitigate against the challenges that former clinton o.m.b. director, former clinton chief of staff, current secretary of defense leon panetta says threaten our national security? and again we are going to have a choice, mr. speaker. . we brought a very powerful proposal to the floor today. very powerful proposal. for the first time in over a decade, we're trying to get a handle on that out-of-control portion of spending in this budget. just a little bit, mr. speaker. just a little bit. and, again, we just have a different idea of what balance is. we have a different idea of what deficit reduction is.

my idea over deficit reduction over the next five years we reduce the deficit. my colleagues' idea of deficit reduction is we spend over $40 billion above what we were going to spend anyway. it's a difference of opinion. i am glad we are bringing this vote to the floor. i look forward to the debate. i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves. the gentleman from massachusetts is recognized. mr. mcgovern: i yield myself 30 seconds to respond to the gentleman. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. mcgovern: no one is arguing sequestration should go into effect. we don't think that is good for our country. but we think the republican reconciliation bill is worse for the country because the cuts in so many programs that hurts our people. there is no balance in there. there is none in your reconciliation bill. it's all cuts to programs that actually help the people of this country. and then finally, i just say, we have an alternative to sequestration. mr. van hollen brought that before the rules last night. the rules committee republican,

every single one of them, voted no. i yield two minutes to the gentleman from california, mr. garamendi. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from california is recognized for two minutes. mr. garamendi: i think i'll let this thing cool down a little bit, but the gentleman on the other side of this debate is quite wrong. there's no balance in this particular bill at all. there is no balance. the cuts are devastating. meals on wheels for seniors. medicare programs, medicaid programs for seniors, and if you take a look at the rest of the issues, school lunch programs, kids are going to go hungry. there's no balance. there is no tax proposal in this. there is no bat -- balance at all. i have one more problem that's not being resolved. the national flood insurance bill was part of this reconciliation and it has a gaping hole. as the corps of engineers has gone through the nation's levees and downgraded those levees, creating an enormous

problem for agriculture for this nation and certainly in california where many of the levees have been downgraded, it's now impossible for farmers and the agricultural community to obtain loans to continue to produce and to enhance their agriculture production. in amendment, i hope could be put in the bill, would simply require an immediate study by the department of agriculture and the federal emergency management agency to undertake a study on the impact of the downgrading of the levees and the resultant inability to get flood insurance and the impact that has on the agriculture communities. keeping in mind that agriculture in a flood zone is one of the very best ways to reduce the risk. i would hope that the majority would consider as this thing moves along to fold into the national flood insurance program an opportunity for the farm flood program that i've introduced which would allow

farmers to obtain national flood insurance and then the lending that the banks could make available so they can continue to build the necessary facilities for their agricultural production. with that i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from california reserves. the gentleman from massachusetts reserves. the gentleman from georgia is recognized. mr. woodall: thank you, mr. speaker. you know, there are no tough choices here. i talk to the gentleman whose seat i took the other day. i said, john, when you are up here as a congressman you made it look fun. folks were always saying thank you, thank you, thank you, for all the strength that was going on here. -- for all the spending that was going on here. when you increase the public debt in this country by 50% over the last four years, you are out of giveaway decisions. all we have here is tough decisions. that's all we have. i know my friend from massachusetts speaks about passion and conviction. his advocacy for the neediest among us is an inspiration on

the floor, and in committee and on, i don't fault him that for a bit. but i say to my friend, hadn't we given that payroll tax cut for members of congress, we could have provided that food stamp increase that you discussed earlier to an additional two million individuals in this country. two million individuals in this country had we forgone that tax increase here in. we didn't. we chose to go along with the program and cut away, spend away. we can't do that. we have to stop that. and i would say to my friend, because it's hard. i have the same families struggling in my district the same you do. the foreclosure rate in my district is higher than your district. the number of folks going homeless in georgia because of foreclosure is higher than in massachusetts. when you talk about the additional 1.8 million folks, 1.8 million folks, mr. speaker, according to the c.b.o., are going to lose their food stamp benefits under this bill. there's no question about that. but here's the thing, mr.

speaker, and this is important. this bill doesn't cut anybody from food stamps. this bill says the only people who can get food stamps are people who apply and qualify for food stamps. hear that, mr. speaker. the c.b.o. tells us, and my friend from massachusetts quotes that 1.8 million people are going to lose food stamp benefits. but the only change this bill makes is that you actually have to apply for the benefits to get the benefits. so that means 1.8 million people in this country are losing -- mr. mcgovern: mr. speaker. wood wod if -- mr. woodall: if you want to change the food stamp rules, if you want to lax it, then let's not demonize it. let's not say we're throwing poor children out in the streets. we have a successful food stamp

program and why don't we just -- mr. garamendi: if the gentleman will yield? mr. woodall: i yield to my friend from california. mr. garamendi: the fact is 1.8 million people will not get the supplemental food that they get from food stamps. they are going to be hungry, that's a fact. now the fact -- the rest of the fact is the application process has been supported by the federal government and by the legislation so that the states can reach out to those people that are hungry and that are qualified -- that are able to qualify for food stamps. that's gone in this bill. so the ability to reach out and to bring into those programs and beyond that -- mr. woodall: reclaiming my time from my friend. i would say reaching out and bringing folks in the program who do not qualify for the program. the rules for the program are clear, mr. speaker. if you qualify for food stamps, i am the first one who wants you to have them. if you qualify for the snap program, under snap program rules, you should get food

stamps. mr. mcgovern: if the gentleman will yield? mr. woodall: yes. mr. mcgovern: the government accountability office says the error rate in the snap program is less than 3%. what is he talking about when people getting benefits -- i'd like to know the numbers of that. how much? mr. woodall: this is important, mr. speaker. i hope people are paying attention back in their office. the gentleman is talking about the error rate. the error rate. folks who mistakenly got food stamps because in the application process they got the application process wrong. they shouldn't have qualified but they gave them to them anyway. what the c.b.o. says is entirely different. what the c.b.o. says is 1.8 million american families, if they walked into the office today and applied for food stamps today, would not qualify for food stamps. it's not an error. it's not a mistake. it's that the rules of the game have been changed to say we just want everybody, we just want everybody to have a part in the program. when the gentleman says the paperwork nightmare for states, i happen to agree with the

gentleman. there is a tremendous paperwork challenge for the states. this does not solve that. all we're saying go through the application process. to suggest we are trying to take benefits away from people who need those benefits is disengine with us. mr. mcgovern: if the gentleman will yield? mr. woodall: i'm prepared to reserve. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia reserves. the gentleman from georgia has six minutes remaining. the gentleman from massachusetts has 6 1/2 minutes remaining. the gentleman from massachusetts is recognized. mr. mcgovern: half a minute, mr. speaker. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. mcgovern: the gentleman is wrong. just wrong when he talks about the abuse in the snap program. that people are somehow getting benefits that they are not entitled to. and the demagoguery that is going with categorical -- it helps people who are eligible get the benefits. no, i am not going to yold to the gentleman. he gets up on the floor and

talks about it this payroll tax cut for members of congress. that was a payroll tax cut for the -- for everybody. now, if he wanted to exempt members of congress, that would be minuscule. that would do nothing to provide any benefit to anyone. i reserve my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from massachusetts reserves. the gentleman from georgia is recognized. mr. woodall: mr. speaker, i would say to my friend, i wish he would show me the code sections here that if in the snap program and say under the snap program the income criteria we had yesterday, that's changing and so folks aren't going to get those benefits tomorrow. that's not here. all this bill does is to say you need to apply and you need to earn those benefits on your own merits. when the gentleman talks about paperwork, he knows good and well the c.b.o. took that into consideration. when the c.b.o. says 1.8 million families are no longer going to qualify, it means some folks are going to get off of categorical eligibility because that is the gaming of the system and they are going to go back in and apply for the

benefits and get them but 1.8 million will go back in and apply and get denied because they don't callify for benefits. -- qualify for benefits. mr. speaker, if we need to change the eligibility criteria, if we have folks in need who can't qualify, let's change the eligibility criteria. but in the name of good government, when we are going in programs and say we have rules of the game, we just want people to have to follow them, to somehow define that as being mean-spirited, it galls me. with that i reserve my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia reserves. the gentleman from massachusetts. mr. mcgovern: mr. speaker, let me yield myself a minute. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. mcgovern: what galls me is that the republican majority is balancing the budget on the backs of the most vulnerable in this country, the poorest of the poor. the gentleman talks about c.b.o. c.b.o. says that cutting $36 billion from the snap program means that more than 22 households will see a cut in their benefit. it means that 22 million families will have less food

tomorrow than they do today. in fact, two million people will be cut from snap altogether. that's not me making up numbers. that's c.b.o. that's where i get this from. i think that's cruel and inhumane during the worst economic crisis that we've faced. yes, we have to balance a budget and we have to make tough choices but why does it always have to be on the backs of the most vulnerable? why can't donald trump may a couple more dollars in taxes? why can't we end the subsidies to big oil? why can't we have warren buffett pay the same tax rate as his secretary? that's all we're saying here. your reconciliation bill represents your priorities. what we're arguing is your priorities are wrong and bad for the country. we have an alternative. you won't let us have an opportunity to debate that alternative on the floor. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves. the gentleman from georgia is recognized. mr. woodall: mr. speaker, i'd say to my friend from massachusetts, and i'm prepared to close if he has any more speakers. i would yield to my -- i'd reserve and enjoy my friend

from massachusetts to close. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia reserves. the gentleman from massachusetts is recognized. mr. mcgovern: mr. speaker, i'm going to urge my colleagues to defeat the previous question. i'll offer an amendment to this closed rule to let the house work its will and give mr. van hollen's substitute an up or down vote in the house. i ask unanimous consent, mr. speaker, to insert the text of the amendment in the record along with extraneous materials immediately prior to the vote on the previous question. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. mcgovern: mr. speaker, you know, i think what we're talking about here today are two different visions for this country. the republicans have their vision. that is outlined in their reconciliation package. mr. van hollen i think has adequately summarized what the democratic priorities are. the difference -- main difference in their proposal there is no balance. it's a meat ax approach to everything. cut, cut, cut, cut regardless of what it means to the people of this country. what we're trying to do and

quite frankly what other bipartisan commissions have recommended is a more balanced approach. we cut spending but there's also some revenues to be raised. and at a time in our country where we have a tax code that allows warren buffett to pay a lower tax rate than his secretary, it seems that we can have -- it's time for a little fairness and that's all we're asking for here. that's all we're asking is for a balanced, fair approach. we're prepared to make the tough choices. those tough choices means cuts. i say to the republicans, you'll have to support closing tax loopholes and raising taxes. on the wealthiest individuals in this country. mr. speaker, i'd like to ask unanimous consent at this time to insert in the record a letter from the u.s. conference on catholic bishops. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. mcgovern: and i want to read one paragraph from that letter to congress.

i quote, the catholic bishops of the united states recognizes the serious deficits our country faces and we acknowledge that congress must make difficult decisions about how to allocate burdens and sacrifices and balance resources and needs. however, deficit reduction and fiscal responsibility efforts must protect and not undermine the needs of the poor and the vulnerable people. the proposed cuts to programs in the budget reconciliation fail this basic moral test. the catechism of the catholic church states it is the proper role of government to make it accessible to each what is needed to lead a truly human life -- food, clothing, health, work, education and culture suitable information, the right to establish a family and so on. poor and vulnerable people do not have a powerful lobbyist to advocate their interests but a they have the most compelling needs, end quote. mr. speaker, that paragraph sums up what i feel and what so many of us feel about what my friends on the other side of

the aisle are doing. . yes we have to make tough choices, but why are always the tough choices on the backs of middle income families and the backs of moore? there are people in this country who are hungry. we are the richest people on the planet and we have hungry people here. what is our response? not to help a way to figure out how to deal with this scourge, their response is to take a meat axe approach to snap. which will cut benefits. that's what c.b.o. said. it will cut benefits. people will have less food tomorrow than they have today if this were to become law. i think that's a horrible choice. that's not a choice we should -- we shouldn't be discussing on the floor. let's make the programs more efficient. let me tell you the snap program is more efficient than the pentagon. the waste, fraud, and abuse at the pentagon, the wasteful weapon systems at the pentagon. i will tell you, i don't care what leon panetta says, there's savings to be found in the pentagon budget.

we ought to go after that. we ought to make sure that donald trump pays his fair share in taxes and ought to close these corporate tax loopholes that allow corporations to get away with paying no taxes. middle income families can't do that. this is about fairness. that's what we are looking for. fairness and balance. this is a tough time. rather than following the european model which my friends seem to love of as you taret and cut, cut, cut -- and austerity and cut, cut, cut, we should invest in a robust highway bill to put people back to work, investing in education making sure our young people are compared to compete in the 21st century economy. and yes, investing in a social safety net and investing in programs that provide a circle of protection to the poor and most vulnerable. there is nothing wrong with that. we should be proud of the fact that we are a country that cares . let's not give that up. that's a strength.

it's not a weakness, it's a strength. and i said to my colleagues, my biggest problem with the republicans is it fails that test. what it does is it goes after the most vulnerable in a way that i think is cruel and wrong. mr. speaker, you urge my colleagues to vote no and defeat the previous question. i urge a no vote on the rule. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from georgia is recognized. mr. woodall: mr. speaker, i thank my friend from massachusetts for joining me on the floor today. i think he chose exactly the right choice of words when he was trying to make his points. describe your opposition as hating women and children and that's your best chance of winning the argument. if only it were true. that's what i hope the american people take home from debates like these, mr. speaker, is that there are serious challenges here and serious people here trying to solve these challenges, but we get wrapped around the axle in the name-calling, i hear, that i argue does nothing to feed a child, take care of a family.

the gentleman says that we are the richest nation in the world. i would tell the gentleman there is no poorer nation on the planet. there is not a nation on the planet that has borrowed more money than this nation has. not one. not one. what do they say about socialism, mr. speaker? it's a great plan until you run out of other people's money. guess what? we are running out of other people's money. i want to show you a chart, mr. speaker. this is a chart -- i'll show it around so other members can see it. the green line represents tax revenues this this country, it goes back to 1947. what you can see is tax revenues are fairly flat because of the economy. because this goes back to 1947 it reflects the new deal with f.d.r., all of that growth in government. the redline is the spending, government spending. it goes all the way through 1965. it reflects lyndon johnson and alt great society spending that goes on. what you'll see, i want to make sure my colleagues can see it there, the redline representing

where spending is going in this nation. the green line representing where taxes are historically in this nation. mr. speaker, does this look like we have a tax problem here? does it look like we have a spending problem in this nation? taxes have remained the same as a percent of g.d.p. as has spending until now. until now we have a spending driven crisis in this nation. i say to my friend, again he chose all the right talking points. they want to protect the rich. they want to protect the oil companies. i will tell you there's one bill, mr. speaker, you know it well, there is one bill in this congress that eliminates every single corporate loophole exemption deduction and break. there's one. that same bill, mr. speaker, eliminates every loophole the wealthy use to avoid paying their fair share. every one. mr. speaker, it is the single most popular co-sponsored tax bill, fundamental reform bill, in the house and in the senate, it has almost 70 members in the house, it has nine members in

the senate, and there is one democrat on it. one. mr. speaker, given the right speech down here about what folks ought to do doesn't move us in the right direction. put your name on some legislation and moving something forward gets us in the right direction. this budget committee chairman sitting here beside me, i'm proud of him, chairman paul ryan, that's a name known around this country as a man who is trying. there are a lot of folks here known for blaming. there aren't many folks known for trying. we say we don't care about the slings and arrows. america is facing a crisis and if not me than who? we got that in the house-passed budget, mr. speaker. folks who said if not me, then who? they made tough choices. here we have the first reconciliation bill, first reconciliation bill. my colleagues on the other side are going to offer a motion to recommit to this deficit reduction bill that actually increases spending. and called that balance.

mr. speaker, food stamp program spending has increased 270% over the last decade. the mean-spirited folks that my colleagues talk about want to increase it by 260% instead. these aren't easy decisions, mr. speaker. but they are not going to put one family that qualifies for food stamps out. not one. not one. we are going to move beyond the demagoguery, mr. speaker. we are going to move into the real business that governing this nation takes. i hope we'll get a strong bipartisan vote on this rule. i hope we'll get a strong bipartisan vote on the underlying bill. i urge my colleagues to vote in favor of both the rule and the underlying bill w that,

future of indiana and the united states. the spend a great deal of time talking about what is broken in our country. to some degree, that is the nature of their business. " we should also have confidence -- but we should also have confidence that the unique american experience is alive and well and our political systems can still work.

>> tuesday night, richard lugar lost to richard murdock. look back at his sixth term career, including his work in the 1990's with the nuclear disarmament program. all online at the c-span video library. >> i thought it was important to write a book that took people's movement seriously. the movement that elected president obama. how they built over time? he did not come out of nowhere. also the tea party movement which seemed to come out of nowhere. how did their work? occupy wall street. i thought those were important things to look at as social movements. a. we the people perspective. >> the former white house adviser van jones on social movement in america today. on a book tv. also these weekend, he contends

that modern liberalism is flawed and has no answers -- answers for today's global issues. sunday night at 11:00. part of "book tv" this weekend. >> next, a discussion about 2012 election issues. karl rove sat down with joe trippi and a forum hosted by the "the wall street journal" editorial board. they say this year's presidential election could come down to the state of virginia. from the waldorf-astoria in near city, this is an hour and 20 minutes. i am pleased to welcome you here. we are delighted you're here. we hope to do this on vacation

-- on occasion three or four times during the year. it is great to have you here in this turn for an interesting inaugural events. we have two experts here, karl rove, the star of stage and screen. before that, a deputy white house chief of staff and architect of the revival of the republican party in texas. joe trippi is a sometime debater on television. he is a noted democratic strategist and innovators in the use of the internet in political campaigns. this also the man who helped to

bring howard dean that close to winning the democratic nomination. he was one shot away from the -- shout away from the presidency. he has helped with the jerry brown's campaign in california in 2010 as well as many campaigns overseas. we are going to have a final -- fun conversation. i want to start. we will open up to questions. i want to start by saying if we -- seeing if we can get into the head of the campaigns as they are right at this stage in the election cycle. they're trying to size of the -- up the challenges they face. i want to start with you. i want to ask you of things to talk about from the obama campaign. you ran an incumbent reelection campaign. you know what it is like to be

48% approval, no sure thing. to get re-elected. what is the obama team thinking about the challenges and what they need to do? >> their two ways to answer that. one is what challenges they recognize they one have and what challenges they don't know. they have the advantage of time. they have spent a lot of time working on this of battleground states. he has held more fund-raisers than all of his predecessors back to ronald reagan combined in their entire campaigns. >> don't you in the that? -- envy that? >> in a way i do. butas somebody who is but inside the white house, if you get that 130 presidential fund- raisers that that is an enormous drain on the present time. time.the president's

he does have a day job. there's a constant tension between doing the job you're supposed to be doing in trying to run for reelection. he has already had more than 2.5 times as many fund-raisers as bush had its entire re- election even though that they began the elections at the same time. he has had that advantage. he has a very large apparatus aimed at persuading in getting out the vote that is an army persuasion. they have the advantage of 12 years' worth of advances in the internet and applications and technology that will allow them to do interesting things. they have the advantage of money. they will not get to the billion dollars they leaked to abc last april. i think they will get close to

$700 million. they do have the advantage of getting out there early. the natural thing is the -- neutral thing is the presidential job approval. we had 49 at this point. i think the job approval matters. elections are not simply one number. they are very complex equation. the thing i would look at is the other number that matters, do the american people see you as a leader? there's a very weak condition. do the american people see you as having accomplished some big things that are popular. there he is in real trouble. the stimulus is seen as a profound failure. the affordable care act is this

is the only piece of modern social legislation that has become less popular after the passage. you can not find this and any other legislation. even the '64 civil rights act is more popular 6 and 12 months later in the south than was when it was passed. this thing has become less popular. it is the biggest challenge they have. romney is weird. he wears a strange underwear. which is a subtle form of religious bigotry. it is effective in some elements. he is the most rapacious of the los some creature in america, -- will some creature -- loathsome creature in america,what you want to re-elect him?

he is a leader who is confronted the challenges and got as moving in the right way. ? the recession ended in 2009. the recent poll shows 75% of the people still think we're in a recession. they have a real challenge. he have to run for reelection on the basis that i have done things that you do not agree with that you have to conclude i did the right thing. >> if you are able to do that on the war? >> a bush was seen as a strong leader. but some people say i like him personally which is good for obama. people like him. but they do not like what he has done. they need to say i like you and i feel like i can relate to you. i know what you have done. i know what it is that you what to do. i may not agree with everything but you.

it is that last part of it. do they see him as a strong leader? it is thought enough to say -- not enough to say osama bin laden is dead. they know they're starting with a stronger a lecturer base. they also understand this election will come down to a handful of states. 10 or 12 at most. they're in a very tough reelection battle. victory is not clear or assured at all. >> talk about the difficulty with accomplishments. they've got them but they're not popular. you can argue the auto bailout is michigan.

-- is popular, certainly in michigan. of course the killing of osama bin laden is popular. what do they do with the achievements they not as popular as they would like? >> they are moving forward. the insinuation would take us back. -- is romney would take us back. i think that is going to work for them if romney does not put any bold ideas out there. he has had no real big vision there.he has utput out romney has not put out a big election. he is busily running on that he is not obama. the one thing i disagree with is on the money side of things. i think this comes down to maybe five states. i do not think arizona is in play.

there are other places. pennsylvania could be. this is one to come down to -- going to come down to three or four states, probably virginia, ohio, and florida. we can quibble over other states. in the end, that will come down to -- it could come not who is better on the ground. forget all these bigger issues. we have all these bigger issues that we are talking about. >> you just mean getting your voters to the poll. >> we're now starting to see obama would democrats 10% higher energy than republicans. that has totally flipped from the beginning of the primaries. i do not believe obama is only going to get 700 million.

they are spending the bulk of their money on online ads that are what we used to do in direct mail solicitation. he would go out and lose money trying to get people to buy a subscription now. here is an idea. on the day that the obama campaign was over in 2008, they had 110,000 twitter followers. today it is 15 million. they have a targeted list and they have built the millions of americans. last time, 3 million people gave them $500 million.

if that goes to $5 million, given the scale of the network -- 5 million people, given the scale of the network, when they go into recess listen, they will get up above $1 billion. that is not the thing that matters the most. the romney campaign has not build the effort and a lot of these states that the obama campaign has on the ground. millions of people are going to be out there. i know people think others are as don't think people are energized. the republicans missed out on the importance of building a network. i know this is not quite like the standard talks. it is going to be the economy this time, too. the network is this time.

they know it. in the end, this could end up being the differential in terms of who wins the election. >> duck have to have a larger thing to sell to these people? -- don't you have to have a larger thema to sell to these people? what is the presence message going to be? -- president's message going to be? to mobilize his forces. >> it is a message of moving forward. >> to what? talking about he took credit for saving the automobile industry. it is not -- what is the message independents to move to them?

the independents tend to be anti-incumbent. forget about the race. they tend to be moving against anybody that is in. a lot of what we saw in france and greece, you are seeing this all around the world. i think independents will be a bigger edge for romney. i think this is going to be about do we go back or forward? that is what the president wants to make this about. bromley says it is about moving forward. -- romney says it is about moving forward. we have to have some ideas. so far he has avoided them. or marrying onto ideas like paul ryan and others that i think are not going to sell. they're not his ideas for the

most part. they are not selling with people in a way that gets them excited. >> two minor point. obama does not have the enthusiasm among his donors. the first quarter of last year -- the go back to the people who supported it, you expect a lot of them who are getting going again. 7% range. -- renewed. that says to me that there is a disappointment among the donors. this week they're asking to send $3 to have your name put in the hat so that the president obama come see your state he will give you a shout out during his speech.

this may be smart marketing. it speaks to a profound absence of message and a disappointment. it is but what is the price point at which some and says"3 bucks, shit, i can put that in"" as opposed to $25 because i want to change america? >> that is the next step. when you acquire somebody on some bases, give us money because we are going to do x and stand up for israel and that universal health care. what ever reason it is you solicited them on is the reason they can renew. you might get lucky. he might have dinner the presence of the united states. withu might have edidinner the president of the united

states. both sides will have armies of persuasion. the democrats will build this on internet technology and applications and the web. and social networks. they will try to take the social characteristics of joe and matching up with other people. >> he did that beautifully. >> feeling that of the people in his neighborhood to do that. -- he leaned back up with people in his neighborhood to do that. people who were the chairman of the bone bank -- phone bank.

most of them are still there. the republican national chairman firm that up and have him there. we are going to have two competing business models. he will link him up and other communities they can reach out. both of them will work. edward? -- they work? may come down to a person of one or two of the vote. -- 1% or 2% of the vote.

will republican army of persuasion and the republican lessening the democratic money advantage mean if it falls back into the republican column? >> take of joe's point of mitt romney and his message. he is arguing, and they're having critics who made the same point. the mayor romney has not put -- that mitt romey has not put together -- he has been able to attack the president. he is not the together a real message. >> since you wrote a column on this, i would be an idiot. -- to disagree with you. >> but he does any way. >> i am not stupid. i agree. it is easy for romney to cure that problem than for obama to fix this problem. it is easier for romney to reach back. that november speech was damn

good. tax reform talks - good. he has talked about his vision for the future. some of this stuff is good. the raw material is there. over the next three months, does he get into a routine to the time he gets to labor day, that stuff is ingrained and easy to talk about and fluid in defending it. obama's problem is that they blew it. the time to set up the election is not in the election year. it is in the previous year. to be the president of the united states in 2011. screw the politics. keep focused on your job. that is where you said the image -- set the image of what you're all about and then build on it. the biggest mistake they made was having an on substantive address last year.

can you tell me what the theme of this year state of the union address is? i cannot. imagine what would happen if lacher president obama stood up -- last year president obama stood up and said we need to have fundamental tax reform. it would have been fundamental tax reform. what if he said there are some things that i like me may not -- in simpson bowles i like. there seems to be widespread agreement. i will work to get it done. if he had done that, we would say that he is the leader. he knows what he wants to do. he has given us a sense of these big problems. we need to deal with this deficit problem.

what if he said that i'm going to scrub the budget. what if he had done that last year? he would have absolutely taken the air out of the republican tires and the moving ahead. it would allow him to say we have done these things together last year. i am going to naturally build on him. -- build on them in my second term. we have the buffett role which he laid out last august and refused to submit a piece of legislation. he finally put it in february. his people knew what it was. $47 billion of income over the next 10 years.

we are going to give $47 billion. sort of like mini-me, dr. evil. please. not serious. >> tax reform are adequate. you do not think so far rummy? -- for romney? >> in a couple of months he's going to say he treated more private-sector jobs. -- say he created more private sector jobs. as bad as things are when we're in the worst economy we have had in my lifetime, something is right. the guy is the head and everyone in the swing states. he is winning among women and latinos.

dislikealmost such a that they're not seen the glass half full. he has turned the corner. the american people want to see the glass half full, it too. the problems here are the intangibles. does greece and france and europe really move so quickly that it impacts the american economy even if it is not felt here people start to lose more confidence again? that would be deadly. iran could happen.

>> if you get worse. -- it could get worse but they're already there. no president has been reelected with a number that love. 64 say we are on the right track. -- wrong track. this morning, if you turn the corner, it is 44 obama and 47 romney. usa today --there was a front- page article of usa today. obamacare beads and battleground states 47-45. -- obama leads in battleground states, 47-45. i read the whole article with the context provided. he carried these by more than 54%. mccain got over 45%. here we are and obama is seven points below where he was and

romney is where mccain was. romney only needs to win five and he wins the election. >> that is true. -- barack obama needs to win the carry states. nevada, colorado and new mexico. mitt romney cannot get there. latinos. these are state were off three representation with latinas.

she cannot lose that 68 or 19. and win those three states. get him one of them. you get into this. this is going to be fought out on the issues and go forward. she has not done anything. -- he has not done a thing. we're going to have all that fighting. there is plenty plenty of money on both sides. it is going to be the most-an -- negative election that we have ever seen. you have a president with approval rating of 47, below 50. yet the congress with approval ratings the lowest ebb ever been in history. -- they have ever been in

history. you have a republican nominee who starts off with the favorable as of any nominee of any party as ever been at this stage. they're all gone to talk about the positive visions of the future. i am sure it is going to happen. it is going to be that kind of campaign. like the swift vote ads of 2004. regardless of the two campaigns, even if they decided they were going to do something different, the super pacs will have a different view. in the end, it is going to get down to the things that we talked about. i know we talked about the bigger issues. it is going to be how romney does the issues. it could get down to like how he -- to niches.

how he closes the gap with hispanics. if he does not, it really forces them to start getting into a situation where there only a few states left. ohio, virginia, florida. >> you carried in 200444% of the hispanic vote. what was john mccain? >> 31. >> mccain had 5 million fewer republicans turn out to vote. he also had 3 million fewer veterans. the lowest number of veterans to vote in a modern election. immigration policy is.

he has a problem on this issue. >> he also has a big advantage. take a look at the ads inside -- attitudes inside the latino community. here's an issue of jobs and here is the issue of immigration. heaney is to really drive from-- he need to really drive home the economic issues. we are talking about the electoral college. that may come at it from a slightly different way. if romney only carries the mccain states, states like texas, georgia, utah, arizona, gained electoral college votes. states like new jersey, pennsylvania, new york, massachusetts lost electoral college votes. it is already closer the carries those. think about it. 3, 2, 1. in indiana i think it is back.

as having dinner with mitch daniels. is there a white democratic south of indianapolis who is for obama that is not a college professor in bloomington? he said not that i can think of. those three are important. there are 39 alecto college votes. -- a lecture a college votes. -- electoral college votes. correct do you believe those are test dates for obama it? for romney and the best for obama. >> we agree completely on that. those are the three. i think virginia -- this whole thing really could come down to virginia. what is fascinating about that, the irony is that it is largely on his pro-choice message.

and shocked everybody. now it could come down to virginia with the first african american president. part of the reason virginia is a problem for romney right knelt is because -- right now is because of the governor passing the ultrasound abortion measure their in the state. >> requiring an ultrasound for abortion. it gets to the whole forward, back thing.

virginia could be the most fascinating an important state in the country and how it deals with a cross pressures that are going on. >> we agree on the three. i think north carolina is gone as well but it will still make an effort there. virginia is key, too. it would be a shift of 98 if they fell back into the republican column. democrat in 2004 or 2008. -- won with a narrow margin. 2.8% in florida. possible to wind up in the romney camp. ohio has real problems for obama. if the republicans when the five states, all romney need to do to win the white house is when new hampshire or pennsylvania or michigan or wisconsin or iowa or colorado born in mexico or nevada and and he is president of the united states.

niche demographic. if he cannot -- i agree with carl. he can win with 31 some of the latino vote. -- 31 % of the latino vote. but it is tough to win in those states out in the west with that kind of a number. he can win the presidency. >> to people have problems with latinos. mitt romney and barack obama. if you look at the decline in these latino approval of the president, it is at or above the national average and has been consistently so. why? i got a hint of it in some focus groups. we said let's get latino voters

whose principal language in the home is spanish. so you -- people who are not partisan. the swing voter. you're not talking about people who are clued into a lot of american politics. >> they don't participate. they would not be in this room this morning voluntarily. and yet, and those were the attitudes, the economy is bad. i'm worried about job. everything is is getting expensive. things would not work well and say i'm enthusiastic about being for obama, but unglued for politics except on one issue, one issue, immigration. he told us he would have comprehensive immigration in 2008. he had complete control. they knew he was in control of the senate, controlled the house for two years, could have gotten it done. they knew he had promised to put forward a bill. they knew he hadn't put forward a bill. it hadn't got done. you misled us.

this is politics to you. the immigration issue is going to cut, you got to have it not only be lack of enthusiasm for romney. you got to have lots of enthusiasm for obama and it is not there. >> but the president has -- romney has backed himself into a corner on immigration during the primaries and the administration is going to say are you for the dream act or not for the dream act -- >> get your own version of the dream act. >> if you served in the armed forces or go to college, you can get on the path to citizenship. >> i think the republican -- look, we have had bruising primaries on both sides. we had last time -- >> we had a bruising side on the democratic side. the guy who is the inmate in the prison gets 30% in the west virginia primary and carries three counties in west virginia. we got a bruising federal inmate 431, i don't know who the hell the guy is, but it's

the top of the news. >> what i'm saying is that we had, the bruising primary did cause some damage to the romney/g.o.p. brand in the two places that clearly happened was with latinos, he backed himself into the corner with immigration and with women because i think santorum and others put so much on contraception and abortion and the social issues. that doesn't mean that romney can't heal that. that is one of the big challenges that he has to do to have a shot at opening up the electoral thing in the way that you're saying. >> i agree with you about latinos. i think it did some damage. i'm not necessarily it did with women. it was a lost opportunity. every time they talked about contraception and religious liberty and so forth was time they couldn't spend talking about the economy. i like how we fixate on the gap that romney has among women.

obama has a bigger gap among men. again, we have two guys who have a gender issue problem. obama cannot close it with men. romney cannot close it with women. the interesting thing is the issues that drive both of them are going to work to the president's disadvantage as long as romney figures it out. that is the economy, jobs, and growth. >> first of all, i don't disagree with they both have -- if everything stays the same, obama wins. >> wait a minute, wait a minute. 44 obama, 47 romney, if it stays as it is, obama loses. 44/47. 44/47. >> electrical votes. >> no, please, the electoral college. i have been to one of the elections where there was a difference between the lock really college and the popular vote. it was 500,000 out of millions upon millions. it was not 3%. you have a 3% deficit of the polls, you're going to lose the electrical college,

particularly if you are ahead 47-45 in a poll of 12 states that you carried the last time around, 54.3 to 45.7, please. >> i'm sorry it took us off there. no, no, those are good points. the point i was trying to get to is the thing that generally does matter and it doesn't happen in the past, this time it does. what does romney do in terms of his vice presidential pick. as you're talking about ohio and florida, does he -- i think there is a reason for it and rubio and i guess to a lesser extent jeb bush who i think would be a great pick. i don't mean that facetiously or a partisan, i think i would be a great pick, i don't think that will happen. romney has got some opportunity here to knock down or give

himself real play in one or two of those states and i think that's going to have some -- that could have some impact because of what we're talking about. if he could win, i agree with karl, if he can win the three that have traditionally gone republican, indiana, virginia, north carolina, and again, we both agree virginia is really -- north carolina to a lesser extent, but virginia could be a dogfight and go either way, then he has got to win florida and ohio. he has to win both of those states. he really does, romney does. so that's why i think this vice presidential pick and how he goes could impact that. >> when was the last time a vice presidential pick -- >> 1950. >> there was a column in the "wall street journal" last week on the very topic. >> you believe robert carroll's new book, he carried the state because he stole it. separate question. >> what else is new?

>> as a texas practitioner -- >> 48 votes in the 48 primary, you think that was an actual majority, forget it. >> other 1960 -- >> and rahm emanuel is running chicago. >> we'll get to chicago. >> when did a vice presidential candidate really make a difference and carry a state, joe? >> well, i mean i think that is -- i'm saying i think that is going into their thinking. it's clearly looking at who they're looking at. it could -- >> and i was the one that is skeptical. look, all the data show that the average vice presidential candidate has a less than a half i point on the national vote and generally a 2% increase in the vote in their home state. but the point is if you take barack obama's vote total and drop it to and raise mitt romney's vote total in florida,

then we have a 2.8% for mitt romney. it could be the first time since 1960 that it becomes dispositive. if wisconsin is wisconsin of 2000 and 2004 and you put a paul ryan on the ticket, bush loses the state by 5,000 votes in 2000 and half a percent in 2004. if wisconsin is like that and we add paul ryan in, we get two points. then wisconsin and 11 electoral votes are in there. let me say one last thing. this is your trivia question of the day. in the last 50 years since 1960, what vice presidential, not once, but twice moved more of the vote in his home state, a thing a political scientist calls an expected two-party vote, who is the vice presidential vote who increased the vote total in his state by reaching across party lines and getting people, independents and people of the opposite

party to support the ticket. who is the record holder? dick chaney, wyoming, 11-point increase in 2000 and a 7% increase in 2004. >> that's odd. [laughter] >> it shows his ability to reach across party lines in wyoming. [laughter] >> and of course, it had no impact on the election. >> to meet karl's point, had gore picked bill nelson, the senator from florida, would that have been -- because the election was so close -- the reason the v.p. hasn't mattered in most elections because the race is mostly -- walter monday dale, -- monday daily, would -- mondale, would it have mattered who he picked? this is so tight in big key -- >> your choice would be for romney, your advice would be to

go with someone like a portman or a rubio who can help you with a state? how about ryan, wisconsin, good choice? >> oh, man, you got to be doubling down on a lot of issues to do that. it's going to be tough, because of some -- >> it depends on what happened on june 5. if walker wins by a good margin, five, is six points, wisconsin is in play. if he ekes out a narrow victory or loses, then it probably means that wisconsin is not in play. $70 million is going to be spent in the wisconsin special gubernatorial recall and no presidential campaign is going to get upper midwestern recalcitrant norwegians to vote for him. >> after wisconsin -- we're left with a bunch of germans.

>> let's open it up to the audience, if we can. i would like to take some questions. yes, right there. we have microphones here for you. >> good morning, and thank you for a great panel. i'm a member of govern romney's national hispanic committee. one of the things they couldn't agree more with mr. rove is that president obama enjoys a compliant media like nobody else i have ever seen. we can see that by the way that this statement by one of the republican liasons about governor romney's immigration policy, he has one and he has one that is probably better than anything that obama has put out because he doesn't only

focus on the people who are here illegally, he wants to bring the best and the brightest. you can see everything he is proposing on his website. what is important for the media to focus on is that latinos are going to be won over by the facts, the fact that nobody has reported more people in history than obama, the fact that unemployment is higher among hispanics than any other demographic group in the use and the fact that hispanic children are at the highest level of poverty also in the history of the united states. 60% of latinos don't know that the challenge is not how to bring them over on immigration reform, but just making sure that the community, the latinos community knows these facts and understand the failure of president obama. >> look, i agree he has a lot of ammunition. and the comments about self-deportation, for example, have indicated to some in the latino community that he does not have respect for them.

look, you want to see some hard asses on litigation, you go to texas and speak to latino ranch and farm owners and they are hard ass on illegal immigration. they are the first to feel the adverse effects. the ranches are being trampled upon. the cartels are shooting at them. they are competing for jobs. the neighborhoods are at risk. there are a lot of reasons why they're hard asses on them. they want to know that the republican presidential candidate has respect for the community and has recognition that this is not a mexican problem. the illegal people came from hong kong and others on avisa and overstayed it. the idea that the illegals from central and south america and from mexico are all shiftless, won worthy, untrustworthy criminal elements which where a lot of republican rhetoric gets

damn close to saying is a real problem. >> thank you. >> yes, sir, right over there. yeah, we'll get behind you, thanks. >> i have a question relative to the fact that president obama is attacking romney on both policy issues and personal issues, particularly the high crime of being successful. on the other hand, romney is attacking obama on the issues but not on obama as a person. do you think that's a mistake? do you think romney should equally go after obama as a person just as obama comes after romney as a person to better acquaint the american population of who he is and european socialist and doesn't think like an american? do you think that should be brought out in the campaign? >> no. [laughter] >> there is an advantage to romney keeping it where he has got it which is to use the president's own statements,

promises, pledges and actions in order to paint a picture of him. the president makes a huge mistake going after romney in the way that he has. let me give you an example. the one-year anniversary of osama bin laden. what would happen if the president had said, you know what, let's not make this about me. let me get on a chopper or let me get in a motorcade and go out to the c.i.a. we'll have to have a camera shot outside, but i'm going in and in a private meeting with them, tell the c.i.a. how proud i am of them of what they have done in following these thin threads of evidence for years in order to find him. i want to thank them. i want to stand in line, shake the hand of everybody i can for three or four hours and be them and tell them it's about them. i'm going to get on the chopper and i'm going to fly down to virginia beach and meet with the families of seal team six. again, no cameras present. i'm going to thank them individually. i'm going to hug the wifings and tell the children they have

ever reason to be proud of their fathers for what they did. i'm going in chopper and go back to the white house and keep my mouth shut. by making it about them, it would have been big. he has power tactics and have a webcam pain ad and put bill clinton in there in order to say that the damage, if this mission had gone bad and these guys had been killed or captured, the political fallout for the president would have been horrific. what about the men and women whose lives would have been affected by the death of seal team six members or their capture. how difficult for them? he then says mitt romney wouldn't have made the same decision? it's supremely ironic that the attack was made on a sunday morning talk program by joe biden which at the time the record, the leaks that they had about their discussions about whether or not to launch the attack had birdie saying, no, no -- biden saying no no we

should do this from 40,000 feet from a b-2 bomber and obama rightly overrode him. send in the seals. eyeball, pull him out if we can and make sure we have the right guy. biden in the latest iteration of their discussions said don't do it at all. biden said don't do it at all. you can't put romney in there, by god, he wouldn't have done it. romney had the exact right answer, hell, even jimmy carter would have done it. [laughter] >> this is a mistake the president makes. and romney had better not make the mistake of getting drawn into this kind of back and forth, your character. the people are up for grabs in this election that romney needs to get like obama. they may be proud that they prouded for him and said something good about our country what he did. they're terribly disappointed by what he did in office and

they'll make him defend if you call him names. call him a socialist, attack his character. it causes people to say every argument in politics generates a counterargument. that's the counterargument you don't want to have. you want to say, look, this is what he said. unemployment at 6%. the mid session review said in 2012, the united states will have 6% economic growth. the president signed off on that the president put out a budget -- we're in a battle over student loans and obama is saying, by god, you know, we can't let that interest go up to 6.8%. we have to lower it to 3.4%. mr. president, your budget in secretary said to raise it to 6.8% because you needed the money to pay for obama care, please! so don't do that, joe. >> i don't know about equal time on that. >> go ahead, joe. we want to hear you. >> he was on a roll. he was excited. >> the filibuster stuff really

works on the republican side. >> look, i think the real problem is -- and i was going to say, there has been i think a 10-year on wall street, corporate america and in the romney campaign about the anger that a lot of americans have about fairness of what has happened to the country over the last few years. i think there is a difference between the president talking about that and fighting for fairness for the middle class and taking that as an attack on mitt romney because he succeeded. that is how romney wants to see it. it's not going to work for romney. he has got to talk about it, too, and he did one time. it was a spectacular victory speech, do you remember what state it was in? >> he first said it in a debate

and i think it was then following michigan. >> for the first time he really framed fairness in a way that would work for romney and made a lot of sense. i haven't heard it since and i don't know whether there is something in my data, but instead he falls into the trap then, if you start to take umbrage at it and come back and say to be talking about fairness to president attacking the rich, it's a bad thing for romney to do. he stumbled into it. he had it articulated right. i wish i could remember the language. i don't know if you do, but i really remember -- >> it was that memorable. >> he has never said it since. that's why you can't remember it. i think it was a big mistake for him to leave that alone. i would go back and look at that speech if i were him.

he finally articulated fairness in a way that would work. >> the gentleman, do you have a question? ok. over here, yes, sir. >> [inaudible] i think many of us believe that it's part of the government's responsibility to create the conditions for economic prosperity. to me that means three terms, opportunity, velocity, upward mobility. we don't see a tremendous amount of that in this economy today. in a nutshell could you tell me what you think each of the candidate's message would be regarding prosperity meaning opportunity, velocity and upward mobility. >> joe, why don't you go first. [laughter] >> look, i think that obama has been -- well, fill, let me do

it this way that we're in, i'm one that believes that we're in the mess we're in over 20 or 30 years of administration. it's not obama, it wasn't george bush, it -- go back whether it was clinton, wherever it all started. the problems that are ending up today that have to get fixed in terms of the long term of the nation have been built up over time. i think obama has been looking at really saving the auto industry, is focused on college tuition and on getting rid of the bush tax cuts to pay for some of this stuff that we got to do. and it is, again, getting down to about it's about fairness but how do we build prosperity. who pays the price for all that. and a lot of is going to be some painful decisions that

have to happen. i think both parties have avoided a lot of the painful decisions. you see that when paul ryan -- i mean anybody that comes up with an idea, regardless of which party comes up with it, the other side automatically knocks it down and we're not going to get through any of this as a nation without making those tough decisions. i think that both campaigns, it's going to be really interesting to see if either campaign are really going to address any of this stuff in this race. i'm not going to be a partisan about this and say, oh, yeah we're going to have this big discussion about how to do it. i don't think that's where we're going to get to. i think it's going to be a negative race and we're going to put off the future auntil after this election on both fronts. i think romney has done that throughout the primaries and i think it's likely to be the same case now as we move forward in the general. and in the end, somebody is

going to, you know -- i think the president will be re-elected and i think then hopefully this polarized mess that we're in, somebody will win a victory so that we can get on with it. >> we're going to have a negative campaign aimed at personalities and attacks and whoever wins is going to emerge with a mandate to do something? that doesn't seem -- >> if the president put out the perfect plan to move the cup forward tomorrow or paul ryan did, the problem right now is in this election year, the other side is going to attack it and knock it down. that's all i'm trying to say. i don't see how we get out of it, unless the american people actually see -- i mean somebody actually puts that out there and the american people swarm to it which i don't see either. >> karl. >> i agree if either side puts out a plan today and the other side will swarm it. that's today and the president

saying i won and stiff arming the opposition. the president needs to take the lead. the president needs to set the tone. the president, and, look, we got elected in a contentious election in 2000. remember florida, we didn't come in with the wave of enthusiasm and goodwill that obama came in. by june of 2001, we passed the bush tax cuts with a quarter of the democrats in the senate voting for it. the way we did it was negotiating with him. this president came in, his biggest problem was he had too many democrats in the senate or house and never needed to talk to the republicans and doesn't do so. i was in new york recently, eight months without being at the white house. i happened to be with boehner shortly thereafter. i was told it was eight months since you were at the white house. boehner that seems about right. my jaw went slack. i reluctantly believed that the only way we're going to be able to get bipartisan in washington is to start again. bush wanted to do it, but we

had florida. when dick gebhardt went on "meet the press" before bush was inaugurated and he was asked was bush was legitimately elected as president of the united states, we were in trouble. gebhardt was a good man and a patriot but caught up in the partisanship. obama had a chance and he blew it. romney will win if romney has a message that has not going got the words right, a country of growth and opportunity and deal with these fundamental challenges and put our fiscal house in order and our education system is failing too many people, specifics enough behind them so people say i got a handle on what you want to do. i may not agree with it all, but you're willing to tackle it and i'm going to give you my vote. >> if tax reform, i want to ask you briefly, is tax reform a winning issue for romney if he makes it a real they --

thematic, a real focus? >> most americans think we have a crazy tax system. if he says i want it to be flatter and simpler so you spend less time trying to comply with it and we spend less time complying with it, you don't think they're beating our brains in for sales around goods and services around the world as a result? we got american companies with $1 trillion of profits stranded abroad. if you're hewlett-packard and you sell in germany and you make a profit and you pay your german taxes and you want to bring it back home, you have to pay a second tax here in the united states. if you're seemans to make a it in germany, you don't pay a second tax. what is happening with that money? we're making it difficult to bring it home and invest it here. if he starts talking about it in concrete ways that ordinary people can get -- let me say something else. tax reform saying i'm doing

something to put our fiscal house in order and tough medicine for us because we have to do it for our kids and grandkids. >> so the ryan plan is a winner? >> i hate to do it on the basis of focus groups. i hate them. >> you hate but you rely on them. >> look, we did so many of them, i'm washed with them, amazed at them. drawing driver in aurora, colorado, said we got to put our house in order. we keep spending, we're going to end up like greece and there is no european union to bail us out, one of the earlyiest focus groups we did. i counted 16 of the next 21 focus groups, someone spontaneously brought up greece. a woman, she literally waited tables in columbus, ohio, and her husband worked in a warehouse. we're spending money we don't have. it's causing everything to cost more from gasoline to health care to groceries. i'm worried about my mom. i'm even more worried about what we're going to do to our

kids. we are spending money that we don't have. the debt has become very concrete in people's minds. it's affecting them and it's more importantly going to affect the prosperity and the future of their children, their family. and you take that in with obama care, you got sort of three big things that people are going to be willing to hear somebody talk about. >> joe. >> it's fascinating that what is going on is in europe where they did austerity, the people are all screaming, it doesn't work, let's get out of this in the elections that they're having and here we got to get to austerity now and clamp down and cut all the spending at a time when it would take, when they're of the other argument is, that's the wrong time to do it. so -- and that's i think what is happening in europe is going to have an impact in our elections. how does that -- how is that

read by the truck driver in aurora, colorado. are they saying they got to get our house in order and. someone like bill gross is treasury secretary that just says we're going to do this all different. that's not going to happen. you don't have to worry about that. i'm just saying, i think there is like this economic issue right now is the president is saying, look, everything else is falling apart. we're not. we're stronger than anybody else in the world right now. and it may not feel, you know, and we ought to keep building that. and we're going to keep moving forward. the more everything else falls apart, it either can make people here feel like, geez, we're next or not again or we're doing better, at least we have got our footing solid or moving forward, which i think is what the entire sort of

messaging of the campaign i think they are right about that messaging. >> i hope they do keep that message. the american people say the stimulus bill failed. they want to keep us from becoming europe. they see america as different from europe. europe is going with the problems over austerity. they are spending a lot more of g.d.p. on government than what we do. americans want to keep us from becoming what americans want to do is keep us from becoming like europe. what we are talking about is restraining the growth of spending. we are not in europe where we say we have to cut the budget by 15%. we have to restrain the future growth. we're having a battle between the rise in plan and the obama plan. both say we spend $3.60 trillion. in 10 years, the ryan plan says that the government budget will be $4.80 trillion.

obama says $5.80 trillion. we are not in a battle where the europeans are saying we're spending $1 trillion of our euros and they have to cut it to 800 million. we are saying that we want someone who will keep us from getting there. >> all open it up again to anyone in the audience. >> i know you do not like to attack obama. >> i like to attack and the right way. to you think it is a paid to do this by threatening tax increases by overburdening businesses with regulations t?

>> the things that he has done has given us the week this recovery. if we have the average we could have about 2500 more per capita in gdp. we have the average growth. i want to be critical of the policy. look. i have this in a rough draft. at all a some at this early in the day. they have plenty of time to do it. i loved it. it is the kickoff speech. president obama said two things. he said i still believe that we are not republicans or

democrats. we're all americans. he goes later on to say that make romney sincerely believes that as long as millionaires like camera doing ok then everybody else will do all right. where did he say that? where did he say everyone else would be alright? he did not say that. i want to deal with the impact of these policies. >> this gets down to a fundamental difference in terms of how people interpret fairness. this is how we view what the president is doing and is fighting for fairness. if he puts it in that context,

it does not give him an opening. this is correct for what democrats have to do. it is going to be interesting to say if romney could go back to this various issue. he tends to fall into ascribing motives. way in the back. >> good morning. as he reminded us at the very beginning of a presentation,

ideology and platform is important and may make the difference. my question relates to the third party. i do not know if rick santorum is the embodiment of that. how do you see that whole dynamic affecting the future of the race? >> santorum is a non factor. the people that are supporting him are in the process of getting energized into the network. the ron paul thing was a different deal. this is about the most unstable political coalition i have ever seen. it only exists briefly and is at war with itself. it has two very different wings to it. it has beyond anti-war types

anti-war, anti imperialists, so far right they show up on the left wing. people a deadly concerned about the actions of the federal reserve. caucus states like maine and minnesota get six delegations of they can place it in nomination. they're trying to influence platform. there be something on auditing the fed appeared this is a weird movement i suspect a lot of ron people are part of the anti-war movement and will not be there

for either party in the fall. whether the fed pagers and survivalist will there, we will see. -- fed haters and survivalist will be there, we will see. >> i think there is a 20% chance we see a third candidates in the race. americans are out there still trying to qualify the ballot. >> we will have a libertarian. this'll be a problem in a couple of close state. >> even have a situation where a is 3% of the votes. we can have the situation that did happen in florida with nader and making a difference in

how the boat goes. i think that is a real problem. we do not know who that will be a real problem for. somebody you is pulling more out of romney or an anti were candidates. -- anti-war candidate. >> being one of those ties with a lot of charges in the basement. >> identify yourself. >> i have more than you do. this should theoretically be a slam dunk for the republicans.

given the economy. given what has happened. why isn't it? what makes people not comprehend what is going on? >> i am a follower of this. i believe we are a narrowly divided country, 50-50. a number of true independence is shrunk to 8% or 12% of the electorate. i have a slightly different view of where we are stuck in those camps. it is not because we have a vigorous debate between two parties that have different ideological views of the country. it is because we have two parties you have fought to withdraw. they're like to exhausted boxers to just pummel each other.

each side has won victories on civil rights and a question of do we need more fairness. i hate that word. fairness in terms of outcome or opportunity. the republicans have won the war over this. what are we going to do about the war on terror attacks each side does not have answers allowed to break the stalemate. one party or another is going to break the stalemate and move it this way and dominate american politics for 15 or 20 years or

whatever. we are dead even. the economy is bad. it stinks. people feel it instinctively. if you are a democrat, you are willing to make accommodations for the president and if you are not you don't. >> it is like a dead heat out there. it is more anti-incumbent regardless of the party right now. you could see republicans take significant losses in the house. thus kinds of things could happen. it does not quite jelled the way we normally would think of it. it what i think the most likely to be with obama then romney.

the power of incumbency, crawl knows what it is like to have that power behind the a in terms of what you can do. the way the electoral map looks in terms of what romney has, if iran may somehow does not get there, or if something goes wrong, a could really go wrong. i do not see that happening with the president. a lot of the avenues they have been through already. that is a very big deal. i think romney may have a great team. they have not been 3 general

election yet. they could stumble. something could go wrong. i think we can have this. but it all falls back in place, it starts to look like a blowout the other way. wow. >> i think we have concluded that we will have a close election one way or another. i want to thank my panelists for their wonderful contribution. in particular, i want to thank all of you for coming to kick off our event series. we hope to see at another event soon. thank you so much for coming.

>> coming up saturday, wrote to the white house with mitt romney as he delivers the 2012 commencement address at liberty university in virginia. to see if live starting at 10:20 am eastern. the primaries continues tuesday may 22 with organ. the contest on june 5 of montana, new jersey, new mexico, and south dakota. the final contest is on the 26 and utah. more from the campaign trail at cspan.org/campaign2012. >> the senate finance committee talked about financial institutions. a portion of that event with paul volcker.

this is 45 minutes. >> thank you for joining us. mr. volcker, nice to see you. we have three panels. i always give moderate opening statements. i want to thank everybody involved for helping pull together this hearing comments getting such excellent qualified individuals to discuss such an important but broad set of topics. it was not easy. i appreciate the cooperation of all of you who are major players

throughout our financial system. i said i will keep my message brief. i am simply saying it is vital we take the necessary steps sooner rather than later to end government policies support and encourage large, complex institutions. that is why i am introducing my legislation that was done formally as the brown/kaufman bill. we know that the full committee's members senator shelby voted against the act in favor of brown/kaufman. thank you to the witnesses that of going to give their comments appeared correct thank you. i enjoy talking to you prior to enjoy your testimony. it i think we all agree that we need a safe banking system. we want one that meets the needs

of the 21st century economy. that is the balance we are looking for. i want to thank you for pointing us to the fact that congress still has not dealt to a the gse. i know this has caused you to be highly honored by people across this country. you must look in amazement on the u.s. congress that fails to deal with this huge problem in our country but has lacked the courage to deal with that. i appreciate you pointing that out. i was thinking as we read getting ready for this hearing, we appreciate the witnesses. the most dangerous thing that a bank does is make a loan. at the end of the day, with out sound underwriting, all the things we do here to not make a

lot of sense. i thank you for your testimony. i look forward to hearing it orally. we're honored to have you here. >> thank you. be a firewall between the banking activities and hedge funds style investment activities by banks. quick thank you. >> i do not normally do cliches. our first one is a man who does not need an introduction. mr. volcker, first as president of the federal reserve bank of new york and the governor of the federal reserve system.

the may have frustrated some bankers on wall street, it there is no doubt our country is a better place because of your hard work. thank you for your decades of service. you have the floor. >> thank you for holding this hearing. we are in banking reform and legislation. this is a good time to view where we are and where we are going. it is a useful service. i will not attend to answer them all. this has changed very broadly from what i used to think of as a profession that concentrated on relationships with their customers and very important ways. it has moved to a much more transaction oriented

concentration. it becomes a lot more opaque. it is very complicated. for a while it was thought that for all the wisdom and engineering and expertise but to table, and itt to the turned out to be an illusion. we had a great break down. obviously reform is necessary. i think the report probably has to go into structural aspects of banking as well as raising capital requirements, better regulations and supervision. to that is important. i do think we need some structural changes. they involve very fundamentally

around this issue of too big to fail. the government is bailing out financial institutions, particularly banks. that is the central issue that runs there a lot of the structural changes which are incorporated basically in the dodd/frank bill. i do not think there has been any legislation in other countries as comprehensive as the dodd/frank a bill. the all have the same problems. all governments are worried about the same thing. this has been a worldwide breakdown. the 90 states can say they have been in the elite -- the united states can say they have been in the lead on financial changes.

it deals in directly to reduce the risks involved. you are absolutely correct. this can be the most risky thing. it becomes riskier when they lose the capacity to deal with the relationship one-on-one with adequate credit control. if you're making some prime mortgages, it has exceedingly risky propositions. banks must make loans as essential to the economy. dodd/frank deals with the problem of derivatives.

everything is relative. i am told $700 trillion of derivatives are out there in the world today. $700 trillion. you wonder if they are all directed towards them explicit risks that can be dealt with by derivatives or they have themselves a kind of trading operation. dodd/frank does call upon a simplification in that area. they tried to put as much of it through clearing houses and selling arrangements. it is contested by the banks. that can be done with the gray massive derivatives. other institutional factors are with a restraint on proprietary

training. i would only say that sometimes it is talked about as purely a risk factor. it is a risk factor. its influence goes far beyond a particular risk involved in particular transactions. it is a cultural issue. hedge funds and proprietary necessarilyt involve big banking complex continuously. traders get to be richly rewarded and the culture of the banking throughout. the other part of dodd/frank i just mentioned, it is the heart

of it, dodd/frank says no financial institution is going to be rescued. it to be liquidated, merged, sold, creditors will be at risk and management will be gone. that is different than what happened in 2008/2009 in the middle of the crisis that raise all the questions about too big to fail. there is a lot of skepticism in the market as to whether whatever the law says when push comes to shove the government collects will rescue them with government money. i think it is overdone. it'll be dealt with. a failure and the management of the bank after the failure,

finding a resolution authority is very complicated internationally. it while i am on the sidelines here, i have been impressed by the amount of effort going on particularly between the fdic in the u.k. authorities on this issue. there is a meeting of minds as to the general approach. it is a meeting of minds and the eurozone generally. getting that down in the complicated way they can work together when you had a failure that is very important. i do think this is good. and testing to summon the point i think are critical. >> i will take five minutes and turn it to the ranking member

and then we will go from there. you talked about the pattern of government support for institution breeding greater risk. sheila bear was a former fdic chair. she said it was important for the government to be sending all the right signals in we do not view it good to keep it alive just because they are big. your comments that the skepticism might be overdone about the view of the government stepping in, but should regulators do to send messages to be markets? >> or any talk about the biggest commercial banking institutions, you have the

proposals on proprietary trading and equity funds and derivatives. to minimize the chance that the bigger institutions will get in trouble to the point they will be rescued. they're on the brink of failure. the fdic has experienced in this area and will act as a liquidator of that institution. it will keep running. there is a continuity in the marketplace. the fdic will have the authority to keep it operating in the short run with areas that

are essential. i think that is possible. as i said before comment to make that a factor, it has very substantial ones overseas. you do want to get a consistency between the u.s. and u.k. authorities. it makes a supervisory challenge to make sure the banks are properly creating these roles. >> bloomberg has released a study that the banking sector is

becoming larger and more concentrating. it is growing faster than gdp. it has been concentrated on the largest banks, the top 10 grew from 68% of all bank assets in 2006 to 77 terror of all u.s. bank assets in 2010. are they based upon these numbers and no end in sight? are the regulators doing enough? how concerned should we be if it is a continuing increase in concentration? >> it has been a great increase. most of it took place before 2006. it's a place in the early part of this century. it was aided and abetted by the

glass-steagall. yesterday i was in the federal reserve. it is a good many yesterdays ago. the united states had one of the most decentralized banking systems. it is going from a very decentralized system to a concentrated system. i think it is unfortunate. in the middle of the crisis it got worse. we have to deal with that. yet people that are much more aggressive than i. some of the things we are talking about will reduce the overall size of the banks. some of the strains will reduce their balance sheets. there is a provision in the lot

they cannot grow beyond certain limits on mergers and acquisitions. there are some limits here. if you ask me whether i prefer a consistent that have less concentration, i would. i think we can live more or less with what we have. >> thank you. >> thank you. thank you for being here. i have read some of the comments that you have made specifically about the volcker rule. i know we had a chance to talk in advance of this. >> somebody read them. >> yes. there has been a consensus around the fact that this is one of the major contributions that you have made in this debate. what is happening as a regulators wrestle with this is that some have different agendas than others.

they have are doing with market making in itself. he had some comments about that. i wonder if he might differentiate between the two. it is my sense that you have no intention to do away with the legitimate market making. this was with the focus of what you were trying to do. >> that is correct. i'm not involved in writing the rules. there may be an effort to try to identify particular transactions in a way that is difficult unless you're sitting on the desk. my view all along has been to things. it is important for the management of the banks. the law says no proprietary trading.

all banks will have strong controls. they do not want rogue traders sitting around jeopardize in billions of dollars of their capital. they will have a rather detailed control on their traders. what is it important is that they take account of the fact that no longer should there be proprietary trading any special proprietary desk. no longer should the traders the taking proprietary risks. i think this can be identified as a problem by metrics afterward. if you look at the size of the trading in position and the volatility.

you look at measures like risk and whether they are suitably narrow a very broad. if you see these telltale signs, there is no question the regulator will get in there. it raises questions with the board of directors. whether the bank is sufficiently charged with what the law says. >> we have looked at some of the rules. i have always understood that what you intended was to keep banks from being involved in pop trading but let legitimate market making was something they ought to do. some of the roles that are being treated, up one had the regulators saying if you are engaged in a market making, it is really a this trading. i do not know many institutions

involved with businesses where they can only lose money. you consider that to be an over reach? >> it is nonsense. until recently, pop trading is a recent phenomenon. they do not go out of resistance. it is very volatile. i read, i think it is appropriate that all the money that was made on trading in this century by banks up until 2007 disappeared in 2008. it gives you a sense. >> an institution that would hold a very small amounts of inventory that was legitimately

held for their customers use, you think that is a legitimate thing for banks to be involved in? i appreciate you saying that. i wish that you could sit down with the federal reserve and '70s other institutions and cause them to simply lay out what it was that you intended when we began this process. i think they are making it overly complicated. i think a lot of institutions have no idea where they're going to end up. >> >> i've had enough of that in my lifetime. the general principle that we described i believe is consistent with my position. he emphasized a small position. i always wonder when they tell me whether the market is so

predictable as christmas sales. the need a big inventory. i sometimes wonder if they want to be prepared for customers trading. why don't they have a short position? they do not have a balanced position. the position is very unbalanced. >> thank you so much. i wish i had more time to talk to you. hopefully we will do that in my office or your office. thank you. >> thank you. i thought i would ask about a couple of issues that have been raised in the context of the volcker rule. one argument is that its door research and decrease liquidity in the trading world and that it will be a very bad thing. is that an issue? is that a problem? >> i do not think it is a problem. i put it the other way around.

this is like to sound extreme but it is not. the market seemed to be very liquid before the crisis. there are lots of complaints in the banking system itself that the laws were to acquit. -- were liquid. it led to some behavior that is destructive. he would not have had all these separate mortgages tie debt up. he should be prepared to keep a for a while. this a be the normal investor reaction. if you think you can traded tomorrow at no loss, and then it becomes a trading problem. if the markets are too liquid, it can give rise to behavior

that is not very useful in terms of banking and finance markets. generally, and i am not alone in this thinking, there is a big movement in europe to make the markets less liquid. the fullest analysis i know of is by the chief english regulator who examined this closely. beyond a certain point highly liquid markets are not in the public use. i will give you another analyses. you want to be able to buy and sell. that does not mean you will buy and sell a long-term security tim is after you bought it. >> another issue that has been

raised is that the volcker rule creates a handicap for american financial institutions. any insight on that issue? >> when i sat at this table many times, a complaint that i would hear all the time was that american banks are at a disadvantage because it is too small. we want to be obeyed. -- to be big like japanese banks. we have to carry more capital than japanese banks. i would rather have smaller banks. we want to make some roles that are consistent with banks doing their basic jobless.

jobs. they are always told by their banks that they will be at a disadvantage to american banks. you are told you cannot do this because you will be discrediting english banks. the fact is the approaches are not that different. the capital requirements should not be that different. the make sure the capital requirements are not that a different. this trading operation, at the bridge look at what we are doing. there no-hit funds come and no equity funds in a commercial

bank. he can have it in the same holding company. it is good to be in a separate part of the holding company. they're going to make a great wall between one-sided the holding company and the other side. i do not know that is any easier. the banks did not like it. there after the same problem. they have a somewhat different approach. i could argue their purchase rigorous than what we have. the banks can choose. i do not think either of them are poison. it became difficult in the middle of the crisis to maintain a distinction between parts of the holding company.

the point i am making is they are somewhat different approaches to the same problem. you can argue all day to which is better are which is worse. >> their focus on the same issue of be sure deposits and access to a discount window's been separated from the discount style. i am out of time. thank you for your commentary and leadership. >> it is away from the banks.

i'm not sure there'll be any contact between this. it turned to have limited ability of hedge funds. it is limited. it is pretty much under control. much giving of their hedge funds. >> thank you. >> thank you. it is good to see you again. one of the last times you appeared before the banking committee was prior to the passage of dodd/frank. it is at a point time where the volcker rule was unveiled the

concept. i remember during the hearing, and i do not have the exact language, we were debating back- and-forth what this is going to involved. what is going to be covered by the volcker rule? the second thing you said was even though it is hard to define, we will know it when we see it. those are not your exact words. clearly, that was the impression i had. now we have a 300 page rule -- go ahead.

>> we have accomplished in 300 pages. there has been concern about the complexity. as i talked at the ground fault local that the minister this thing, they're saying how do we administer this t? my concern is that it is going to be very difficult for people in the field to say you have violated the rule are you have

not violated the rule. it seems to me that the very goal here was to try to deal with these very large institutions that were doing irresponsible things. at the end of the day we are making this so complicated that we are forcing more consolidation, not less. i like your opinion on those two points. are making this so complicated that the baker will get bigger? >> this is a matter that these apply to six, seven or eight institutions. the particular bank is not doing proprietary trading. you're talking about a very concentrated number of banks.

very sophisticated. they had trading desks. there are strict controls over the trading desk. it is $9 million in something. i think he did not have to trace every transaction in real time. and nothing that is the purpose of the regulation. it should have some very sophisticated but not that complex measures but the bank activity.

if they don't, and they ought to be put in jail for having unsafe and unsound banking practices. you can look at these reports. i sat down by the federal reserve. if you see characteristics of thatrading patterns suggests proprietary trading, and then you go look at it. if they say it is a customer trader, who is the customer? you are not making a market when you are buying the same one.

they are in good faith with the management understanding what is at stake. their reputation as a stick with the regulator. to they will table care. -- they will take a dual care. >> i people debt ran this in the past. they tell me not to believe all this stuff. i ran the trading desk. it is the policy not to do proprietary trading. we did not do proprietary trading. the reports showed it. >> thank you. i have one question i want to ask.

senator merkel asked a question about what you answered in terms of british banks and that american banks will have an advantage. we note that the swiss and the u.s. financial sector was significantly larger. their concentration of both were bailed out of billions of dollars for their governments and from others. both have taken dramatic action. i would like your brief comment on what you think about what switzerland is considering. the u.k. has considered fire wall between risky activities and traditional banking. what are your thoughts? >> those banks are no bigger

than our banks. they are more concentrated. they feel even more vulnerable than we feel to these problems. switzerland was obviously very concerned. they had two big banks. both are in trouble. one was in severe trouble. they took exception to high capital standards. my understanding is to find out more directly. the biggest of those banks has privately given out proprietary trading. they have moved away from some of these activities to non risky activities.

there's investment management on the other side. there has been some reaction along the same line of the british banks. they are still open with how they apply the regulations. i was invited. i will have a little session with the european parliament. i think the obvious purpose of the invitation was to try to get a maximum amount a coronation.

>> it has been for years and 95 of the mortgages originated there. how important is it that we move away from that reliance? should they exist in their current forms? >> it is important if you think it is important. it is kind of ridiculous when you look at it. >> read knelt the residential mortgage market is -- right now the residential mortgage market is dependent. hadley wean away from that?

-- how do we wean away from that that let's not make the same mistakes. this is a recipe for affected mortgage market. literally it'll take years. >> thank you very much. >> thank you. it the group of regulatory agencies working on the volcker regulations have indicated that they might not be prepared to implement them in july. should they hold their deadline solid? >> i am not clear what their

attitude is. i am understanding what the basic situation is. there are trying to get the final rule out. they recognize it will take some time to adapt. over a two-year time frame, may be may find particular things you want to change. after july, the law says no proprietary trading. someone told me some law firms set down beds with proprietary trading. i do not even see how this is a contrived. here we are. >> thank you. >> it occurs to me with passage

of dodd/frank, it incorporates the volcker rule and a whole host of other things. it is a complex piece of legislation. at the end of the day, we still have a very small number of financial institutions that control an enormous amount of capital. we have not impacted it very much. >> we do have a much more concentrated financial system. i do think that skepticism about dealing with institutions outside of the banking organization will protect itself. i think the idea that they can and will fail is totally credible to me. when you talk about the biggest

banking institutions, they have a lot of government support. i think they should be regulated with proprietary trading. the risk of the institutions failing will be really remote. you say they have gotten quite concentrated. >> thank you for your testimony and your service for so many years. >> i do appreciate this initiative. >> if you will join us. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> in a few moments, a pentagon newsri