presidential candidates. this is an hour. [applause] >> thank you. thank you, jim, for that very warm introduction. thank you for your leadership with the new england council. thank all of you who are members of the new england council. it is great to participate in this tradition of politics and eggs. i look forward to signing a couple more of those eggs as the morning goes on. i want to thank the new hampshire institute of politics were hopping to organize this effort. i want to recognize some of my former colleagues, one person who i the privilege of working with, paul, who was here this morning. thank you for all your service and what you are continuing to do in your various capacities. mike, thank you for your leadership and past service to the country. larry, thank you for helping to pull this together. to all of you, it is really a privilege to be up here in the granite state of new hampshire. we all know this is a pivotal moment in the presidential

election, and other elections taking place, which present a very clear choice for all of us. i know from my own state of maryland and my travels around the country, including new hampshire, that the american people are fair and that they will examine the facts. they will very clearly examine this choice. i know that new hampshire, given its unique role in the presidential selection process, takes those responsibilities very seriously. i'm very privileged to be with you here this morning. i do believe that the choice in the presidential election has come into much sharper focus since mitt romney, governor romney, selected paul ryan as his running mate. i should say at the outset, and larry indicated this, jim indicated this, the personal

relationship we have is a very good one. we get along well. we have, however, very deep and fundamental differences on where we should go in this country. the good news is that i believe in the budget committee and on the floor of the house we have been able to express those differences in a civil manner, in a way that has sharpened and elevated the debate and made the choice is more clear. i very much hope that as we head into the final days of this election we will focus on those choices that are before us, focus on a very deep policy differences. i fundamentally believe that, when you examine the ryan- romney plan, you will discover that it is simply returning to to a failed trickle-down

economic strategy, a strategy we tried during the bush of ministration, which crashed against the heart wall of reality. after those eight years, we lost private-sector jobs and the deficit was skyrocketing. if you look at the ryan-romney plan, it does provide the big tax breaks to people at the very top on the theory that somehow the trickle-down effect will boost everybody. that simply did not happen. i did not -- i do not know why we want to return to that approach. let's review the facts. it is important to start at the beginning of the last four year story. we all know that the day the president was sworn in he inherited a huge financial and economic mess.

there can be no disputing that fact. let's review some of the specifics. we know, at that time, that the economy was in total freefall. over 800,000 americans were losing their jobs every month. the gdp was plummeting toward great depression levels at a - 8% g.d.p. rate. that was spiraling downward. if you compare retirement savings from the fall of 2007 to the time president bush left office, their value had collapsed by 1/3. these are retirement savings, 401k plans. that is what the president walked into. i should say that it is a very good thing that we did not take the advice of former president bush and paul ryan to privatize social security.

the reality is, had we made that choice that they were strongly advocating, there would have been millions of americans who were put at total economic risk at the time of the collapse of the economy. i am glad we did not roll the dice and take that chance with seniors at that time. millions of seniors rely entirely on social security. millions more have social security as their primary source of income, and yet, when you have that collapsed in the 401k side of the retirement system, that is all many people could have fallen back on. you are rolling the dice with -- people would have been in great jeopardy. that is the situation that the president inherited. he acted very quickly. he acted very quickly. in the face of that economic collapse, he worked with the democratic congress to pass the

economic recovery bill. he worked with the congress to rescue the auto industry and american manufacturing. he took those steps immediately. the results were good. we all know that we have a long way to go in the economy, but let's review the results as determined by the nonpartisan congressional budget office. i am on the budget committee. we have lots of back-and-forth, but there is a referee. the referee is this agency called the congressional budget office. they are professionals who examine the facts and make the best projections they can and best analyses they can. they have determined that as a result of the recovery act and other actions that were taken we this country.

we are spiraling downwards, you enact the recovery bill, he began to turn the corner and move upwards. we have now had 29 consecutive months of positive private sector job growth. those retirement savings that took such a big hit have now comeback and are at a higher level than they were before the big fall. there is much more retirement security there for the american people. since elections are about choices, it is important to ask the question, what was mitt romney proposing at that time? what were the republicans suggesting? mitt romney said, he thought there was an important government role in rescuing the financial sector. when it came to the meltdown in wall street, he said, yes, i think there is a role for government there. when it came to rescuing main

street and the auto industry and american manufacturing, he said now. let them go bankrupt. it is not that he does not see the government playing any role in times of emergency. he was all-in to rescue wall street. he was awol when it came to try to help main street and american manufacturing. you remember when he was in nevada. housing prices fell to no fault of homeowners. he rejected the idea of coming up with a plan to help credit worthy home owners whose home prices have plummeted and were under water on their mortgages. he said, let it hit bottom. that was his answer. he did not what wall street to hit bottom, but the auto industry, american manufacturing, homeowners who

were under water through no fault of their own -- no government role there. what about the new vice- president candidate, paul ryan? it has been reported that, three days before the president was inaugurated, paul ryan and a group of what are called the young guns who are now big leaders in the republican house leadership, they gathered in washington and decided to come up with a plan and how they were going to work against the president. as one of them said, their plan was essentially to oppose whatever the president proposed. this is before they even knew what the president was going to propose. that was their plan. we all know thremark that was made by the republican leader in the united states senate, mitch mcconnell, who when asked what his top party was, he said, not jobs, not the economy, but

defeating the president. right from the start, the president was facing a major effort to defeat him rather than focus with him on solving the problems the country faced. so what happens? the first bill he proposed was legislation to allow women who have been discriminated against based on pay in the work force to have an opportunity to get justice. every republican and the house leadership and voted against that. that was the first bill. pretty straightforward. only three house republicans voted for it. paul ryan voted against it. next up was the recovery bill. not a single house republicans voted for it. again, that playbook was, what the president proposes, we will

oppose. andthat did not stop a lot of republican members of congress, once the recovery bill was passed, -- some of that recovery stimulus money to boost jobs in their own states and districts. many who had been widely reported at the time. just yesterday the "boston globe" had a story about how paul ryan had sent a letter to the department of energy in december 2009 asking for funds to help boost the local economy in wisconsin. the letter said that he would help stimulate the local economy by creating new jobs. again, no votes for the recovery bill, hard illogical line against it, -- the ideological line against it, yet republican members recognize it could help

in their local economies. the president has been the first to recognize that we need to do a lot more to help put americans back to work. he understands that this recovery remains very fragile and that millions of americans are hurting. he has proposed another major jobs initiative. he submitted that to the congress last september. it includes a number of very important elements. one of the most important elements to be a major new investment in our nation's infrastructure. new roads, bridges, transit, ports. if you look at the reports by the american society of civil engineers, not a right-wing group or a left-wing group, they give the united states a grade of d when it comes to infrastructure. if we will compete with international competitors, we

need a 21st century infrastructure. an energy infrastructure, the foundations that help move goods and services around the country and the world. the president proposed $50 billion. major initiative. he proposed additional measures to help small businesses. that was in september. we have not had a vote in the house of representatives on the president's jobs initiative. we have now voted 37 times in the house of representatives to repeal obamacare, the affordable care act, but not a single vote on the rest of the president's jobs initiative. now less september the president also submitted a plan for long-term deficit reduction. we have to big parties. one is to nurture and boost the fragile recovery we remain in.

it is important to pass a jobs initiative. we will take other measures to accomplish that. what other measure the president has proposed is providing confidence to the country by extending a immediately tax relief for the vast majority of american people. 98% of the country. 97% of past-through businesses. overwhelming amounts of the american people support this. we need to do that now to provide confidence, but we also need to be serious about taking a credible plan and posture with respect to our long-term deficit. our long-term growth is going to require that we get our deficits under control. we should do it in a balanced way. if we do not get our deficits under control, over time that

additional government spending will crowd out private investment. we have got to do that. the question is, how do you do that? last tender, the same time the president submitted his jobs initiative, he also submitted his plan for a long-term deficit reduction. here submitted that as part of his budget. it would reduce the deficit over 10 years by $4 trillion. that was the target established by the bipartisan commission. he does it in a balanced way. it includes $2.50 of spending cuts for every $1 of additional revenue. a balanced approach, a shared responsibility approach. erskine bowles, one of the co-

penned an op-ed in "the washington post" that says the following. in contrast to romney, the president, like the gang of six and other like-minded members of both parties, has embraced the principle that america will turn the corner on its debt only if republicans and democrats come together to support a balanced deficit-reduction plan. the president has embraced the central principle of simpson- bowles, that we need a balanced approach to deficit reduction. anybody who is a true old-style fiscal conservative recognizes that we have got to get our deficits under control and the long-term. if you are serious, you recognize that we have got to deal with both sides of the budget equation, spending and revenue. that is the great family -- of the romney-ryan approach. the ryan budget, which has been

embraced by governor romney, he says he would sign it if he were president, takes a totally uncompromising, hard-edge, right-wing ideological approach to our economy and our budget. it doubles down on this notion that somehow tax breaks for folks at the very top will boost the economy. it does so at the expense of everyone and everything else. let's online this a little bit. it would provide these big tax breaks. the theory is that providing people like mitt romney another tax break will trickle down and boost the economy. as i said, at the outset, we have tried this before. it is no longer a theory. we have the evidence. the results are in.

at the end of the eight years of the bush administration, after tax cuts that disproportionately benefited folks at the very top, we had a net loss of private-sector jobs. the only thing that went up was the deficit, and it went way up. so why in the world would we go back to a playbook that did not help the economy and drove up the deficit? we know from the clinton years that a balanced approach to the economy and to the budget and to deficit can lead to huge job growth. 20 million jobs were created during the clinton administration after the 1993 clinton tax plan. the president is saying with respect to fall to the very top, we can no longer afford that. republicans have taken a position -- they will not pass it now because they will hold middle-income taxpayers hostage until they can get cuts for the folks at the very top.

i thought they agreed we had this long-term fiscal challenge we had to deal with in a balanced way. that is one problem. the economic theory has been tested by reality and it failed. here is the thing that will become very clear in this campaign to the american people. it is not just that tax cuts for the wealthy do not work in terms of boosting the economy -- they come at a huge cost to the rest of the country. if you are serious about deficit reduction over the long- term, and all of us should be, if you ask nothing from the faults of the very top, if you subscribe to the grover norquist pledge, as 99% of the republican house members have, it says not one additional penny of revenue can come from the wealthiest americans to help reduce our deficit. not one penny. the american people can do the math on this. if the sick and the outset that

you are not going to ask for one penny from the wealthiest americans, and you want to deal with the long-term budget deficits, everyone and everything else gets hit. of's look at a couple examples. let's start with middle-class taxpayers. the tax policy center, which is an independent, non-partisan body, recently did an analysis of the romney tax plan. they concluded that by providing these tax cuts in a deficit-neutral manner, you will end up raising the tax burden on middle income taxpayers. you will have to eliminate a lot of deductions in the tax code that to help middle-income taxpayers. mortgage income, the current exemption for the cost of health insurance provided by employers, all of those deductions are at risk.

therefore, the price to be paid for tax breaks for the folks at the very top, another round of them, if you want to do it in a deficit neutral manner, which they want to do because they say they are real fiscal conservatives, that means other people are going to have to pay more through eliminating some of those important deductions the people rely on. i can support tax reform, but i cannot support tax reform masquerading as a trojan horse for just another round of tax breaks for the folks at the very top at the expense of everybody else. i should say that, early in this campaign, governor romney pointed to the tax policy center as an authoritative, independent source when they did analysis that work in his favor. because they are an authoritative source. it should be said that under the ryan tax plan, mitt romney's tax rate would drop to below 1%.

i can understand why governor romney likes the plan. but an independent analysis was done the other day that showed, if you apply that version of the rhine plan to mitt romney's 2010 taxes, it would drop from 15%, which is already pretty low effective rate with some of that income, down to 1%. who picks up the tab for that? everybody else. so it will hit middle-income taxpayers harder. we had an amendment that democrats offered when this plan was put forward by paul ryan. it said, ok, let's test this. we had an amendment that said, when you do tax reform, do not increase the tax burden on taxpayers earning under to the energy to thousand dollars. they voted against it. they know that is the

fundamental indication of that plan. who else is that it? it's our economy and our growth. it hits the opportunity for more americans. again, if you are serious about deficit reduction, and u.s. nothing from people at the very top, you will cut deeply into education funding, deeply into research, science, innovative technologies, and will cut deeply into infrastructure. into infrastructure spending. under the budget plan, it would dramatically reduce it next year. reduce it, not provide a bigger investment as the president called for, but cut it. that is a time when we have needs and also 14% unemployment in construction workers. it will compete with china and india and everybody else in the world, we need a first-class,

21st century infrastructure. had we do that? training and community colleges, -- is a bad investment to do that. to cut that, which allows everybody to reach their full potential. i want to focus on this very important issue -- it hits seniors very hard. seniors on medicare and people who rely on medicaid. there is no doubt that now and over the longer term we need to deal with the issues of rising health-care costs. rising health-care costs are not unique to medicare. we have rising health-care costs throughout our system. we spend 18% of our gross national product on health care, far more than any other industrialized country. there is no doubt that we need

to deal with those rising costs. but there is a fundamental difference between the way the president is proposed to do it and democrats are proposed to do it, and the way that governor romney and paul ryan have proposed to do it. approach,president's as we began with the affordable care act, what we say is that we need to move the health care system, especially in medicare, away from a deeper service system that rewards the volume and quantity of care over the value of care and quality of care. we need to move the incentive structure away from that to reduce costs in the health-care system. let me give you an example. hospitals -- when you are a patient who goes to the hospital, the hospital gets paid by medicare. it should.

they get paid. the patient gets released in the hospital -- they develop complications from the same condition that the patient originally went to the hospital for. they are readmitted. the hospital is paid again by medicare. the hospital has no financial incentive under the current system to coordinate care for the patient once the patient has left the hospital. that does not make sense. as part of the affordable care act, we changed that. we're moving for payments to accounts will care organizations to make sure there are incentives to coordinate care for that patient so you avoid the extra cost for repeated hospital admissions. let me give you another example. a lot of people do not realize that medicare already has a private plan component, medicare part b, private health insurance. it turns out that medicare was compensating private insurance plans on average of 114% of the fee for service plans.

in other words, these private plans that work established to reduce the costs of medicare actually increase costs. one of the things we did is that we began to eliminate those overpayments, the excessive subsidies. they were paid not only by taxpayers to buy every medicare recipient who is in a fee-for- service plan. they pay higher premiums for those plans. we said, that does not make any sense at all. we reduced those. we used some of the savings to strengthen some benefits in medicare. the prescription drug doughnut hole was closed so that fears of high prescription drug costs are not left high and dry. we eliminated the co-pays for preventive health care so more seniors will get preventive care before they get more chronic conditions that are more costly. those of the kinds of things

that we did to save money on medicare. that is how we use some of the money to strengthen benefits. i should point out -- i have two, but i just want to point this out. this is an important issue that we should be talking about. this is what the medicare trusties report says. this is non-partisan. "the financial outlook for the medicare program is substantially improved as a result of the changes in the affordable care act." substantially improved. because of some of the savings we talked about, the dollars can go farther. we use some of those dollars for the purpose of improving the benefit side talked about. what is the romney-ryan approach? it is not to reduce overall

health-care costs. it is to simply transfer those rising health-care costs from seniors on medicare to seniors. that is what the congressional budget office said that under the earlier version of the ryan plan, 10 years from now, seniors on medicare would pay $6,000 more for the same set of benefits. the new plan, it will cost seniors more for the same reason -- they are simply transferring costs off of the medicare program, not reducing costs are saving costs. they are transferring them to seniors on medicare. at the same time, your budget says they will provide big tax breaks for the very top. the other point i want to make is that in the health-care plan for members of congress provides protection for members

of congress against rising health-care costs. it is a fixed percentage, premier support as opposed to a voucher plan. as health-care costs rise, members of congress can be assured that 72% of those costs will be covered by health care -- the health care plan. they are proposing a much worse deal for seniors on medicare than they have for themselves. a much worse deal. under their plan, the way they save money is to de-link the amount that seniors receive from the medicare program from the costs of medicare. the result is that -- i guarantee this will be my last chart -- see the screen here, that represents the steady

premiums support that members of congress get under their plan, 72% coverage. that red line is what happens to medicare recipients under their voucher plan. the amount that senior citizens get for medicare drops dramatically. that means that i did their costs go way up or they get less coverage and less benefits. again, at the same time, folks at the very top are getting a better deal. i will make one last point on this medicare issue. you hear a lot about the fact that the republican plan does not touch seniors over 55 years old. that is not true. here is why. i mentioned that we use some of the savings by getting rid of the overpayments to private insurance companies and medicare to close the prescription drug doughnut hole

and -- the budget of republicans does not cover those things. it reopens the prescription drug doughnut hole, so if you are a senior with high prescription drug costs, you are going to be paying thousands of dollars more. if you use a lot of preventative health care services, that will save money. it will cost you more. immediately, not 10 years from now. it costs you more immediately, and in 10 years when the other plant goes into effect, that is when seniors get a much worse deal than members of congress. mitt romney is out there running an advertisement, saying, the president of the democrats -- they cut medicaid. i think hopefully i have been clear that no benefits were cut. we did get rid of subsidies. companies that were being overpaid. it was a waste of taxpayer dollars.

the medicare trustees said that helps extend the life of the fund. we used that to strengthen this, and in the ryan budget, they took all of those savings. they wanted to pocket the savings from the affordable care at, but they did not spend one penny on strengthening the medicare benefits. they did not get rid of the doughnut hole or help with preventive care. they did not do that. that is why you saw paul ryan on television. they are taking these and running ads against them. they did not strengthen this in their budget, but we did. this is a fundamental debate.

this reduces the health care costs by finding greater efficiencies and changing structures. we do that, and that we can reduce costs without hurting seniors. i am going to close now. this is a brave and courageous budget. i disagree. i do not think it is brave or courageous at all to provide tax breaks to very wealthy people at the expense of seniors on medicare, at the expense of infrastructure and at the expense of taxpayers. i do not think it is courageous at all to offshore more american jobs rather than

creating more jobs right here. i do not think it is good for the medicaid program where two- thirds of which help seniors in nursing homes and individuals with disabilities. and they really lack that. i do not think that is brave or courageous. take the balanced approach that they say the president's approach takes. the hallway or the highway approach. this will take us back to the road of the eight years of the bush administration, and we know what happens at the end of that road. this is going to be huge for the country. i appreciate your time and attention.

i hope this will be about fundamental choices. more for the grass words politicking, the american people will make the right choice and reelect president obama. thank you very much. [applause] i am happy to take questions, yes. >> we can take one or two questions. >> i am involuntary spokesperson for aarp. i am glad you mentioned this. fortunately, i get around to the members and other seniors, and seniors are concerned not only about what is going to be there for their children and

grandchildren. they are concerned about something on both sides, and they read and hear about a $500 billion reduction in care, and that is $700 billion. savings. is that right? >> that is right. this is what they're trying to perpetrate on the american people. this is the great hoax that is being perpetrated by the romney campaign. they achieve medicare savings. we use some of those savings to strengthen medicare benefits,

including providing improved access to services. they take the savings because they recognize that these are part of medicare. they are running totally misleading hypocritical ads. cutting the picture, they are saying that they did not cut benefits. increasing benefits, which republicans cut, and not 10 years from now, now.

thank you. >> you are right on target. why should we be subsidizing private insurance companies. >> thank you for the clarification. i have been saying part d. putin substitute c i said part d. and the other thing with medicare, it is a complicated program. you have part a, part b, part c, part d. part a is the hospital insurance fund. part c, medicare advantage. it is not part d. these are complicated issues. and the romney campaign is taking advantage of this to confuse people, and that is shameful. >> a few weeks ago, a commissioner testified before the committee for the affordable care act.

essentially, and i do not claim to have all of the details. he postulates in a somewhat unusual an unconventional role, and it is not certain. i think we would all agree that it is a 2000 page bill that is complex. are there ways that you can envision that the act may be made simpler or less complex? and what is the likelihood of that occurring after the november election? >> he is hoping that any constructive suggestion, this will fully kicked in in 2014.

the reason the irs is part of this program is because you want to make sure that people can afford health care. it provides tax credits based on your income, so you go into these exchanges, these markets for health care insurance, very much like what federal employees and members of congress have. you go into these exchanges, you will qualify on your income for a tax credit, which would be administered by the irs. the other part is the same as what the romney massachusetts plan does. they probably turn to him and said, "you have a great plan in massachusetts." and most everyone in this room

knows that this was initially a republican idea. therefore, everyone should take personal responsibility for the costs. otherwise, everybody else's taxes go up. let's try to have everybody take some responsibility, for those who need it, you would provide some tax credits, but it would bring down costs overall by creating an exchange, and this will also bring down the costs of medicare and health care system. there would be tax credits to

make this more affordable. and the sec and wait for the romney plan, for those people now can afford health care but decide that they are going to free note on the system, there has to be some mechanism. it is a very mild penalty. it is patterned after that. >> with the leadership council. i was just curious, after the dust settles, there will be a lot of dust, i assume. do you think there would be an effort in congress to reform this, some of the shortfalls that they do anticipate this is

where the doctors are reimbursed. doctors would face a significant cut. we have been dealing with this on an ad hoc basis. we need to put this on a sustainable long-term footing, so, yes, i hope we will address that. second, we should build upon the ideas of the affordable care act in terms of reducing the costs overall in the system. they are experimenting with improving the delivery of care for the medicare and medicaid programs. there are about 10% of the overall population, but this is

about 30% of the costs, and this is between medicare and medicaid for providers, so there are opportunities for some to game the system. so rather than take the romney/ryan approach, to offer low costs on to seniors or dramatically cut medicaid, which, again is what they rely on and others, we should look for ways to eliminate these misaligned incentives, and there is much that can be done. some is underway. we can build upon these ideas. again, this is the fundamental difference between the proposal with what they put out, with the affordable care act this is

putting those costs on the backs of seniors, who, by the way, have a median income of $23,000. the median income of a senior on medicare is $23,000. a good part of that $23,000 income comes from social security. so then i get back to the essential point about the totally unbalanced aspect, to get more for mitt romney and leave everybody else to pick up the bill. >> ok, well thank you very much. [applause]

>> he articulates the positions of his party so well and so clear. these are issues that you can see, and you can see this in his presentation today. we hope these issues continued to be discussed -- this is with the congressional candidates throughout the country. these are very, very important issues. i think you have to feel pretty good that we a people like chris van hollen studying these issues and trying to be objective as much as he can in try to find some resolution.

he is the man to watch. we will watch him. and we look forward to having him back here again. it is good to see you all here again. >> thank you. thanks for having me. [applause] thanks for these introductions. >> i work on them. >> i can tell. >> this is quite a tradition. very nice. thank you. take care.

[inaudible conversations] >> great job. thank you so much for coming. you did a really nice job explaining everything today. i appreciate it.

>> thank you. >> and thank you for coming. >> thank you very much. >> how are things going? >> [inaudible] >> thank you so much. [inaudible]

that was wonderful. >> thank you. [inaudible] >> right. the ads against them. i agree. he lives in maryland. my brother. i did not believe he is in your district. >> no. there are a lot of changes in the district. >> thank you very much. >> it did such a very good job. -- you did such a very good job. [inaudible] >> under medicare, --

[inaudible] in the private market, these are -- [inaudible] >> they wanted to control all of these. >> there is a constant back-and- forth. the insurance plan and a position. the negotiation back-and-forth. in some parts of the country, you will have -- insurance plans that are very strong. [inaudible] there are other areas.

[inaudible] and a lot of competition. it is an issue with medicare. >> thank you. >> i did not want to monopolize the time. -- your time. thank you so much. >> i saw you on television this morning. >> thank you for coming. >> i saw you on tv. i am surprised he did not mention anything about the debt commission. >> i was thinking there might be a question on that.

>> here it is. >> we put together a plan. it is a balanced approach. the cuts were terrible. the deficit reduction. >> had the handicapped it? -- how do you handicap it? >> they will not except one penny to help reduce the deficit. >> what is the probability of the automatic? >> we will have to see. hopefully the election -- republicans will have to take a balanced approach. >> thank you for coming. it is nice to me to. it did a good job. >> thank you, i appreciate that.

>> i just wanted to tell you, -- [inaudible] i voted for you. >> thank you. >> can i take a picture? >> sure. >> i e-mailed him the question. now he is not going to have to answer it. thank you. >> i got it. >> he has got to go. thank you very much. >> thank you. >> i just want to mention, my daughter is a friend of one of your staffers.

>> at the remember what staff-- do you remember what staff member? >> [inaudible] >> thank you a lot. what did i do with that pen? sherlock. -- sure. >> thank you. [inaudible] >> it was very informative. that is the light side of it. it is a serious room. people have a tendency to try to simplify things to the point where it did not convey the importance. >> absolutely. >> thank you so much. >> thank you.

>> take care. >> nice to meet you. we will follow up with your staff. >> that will be great. thank you. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> which is more important? honor. the economy, stupid. it is a kind of nation we are. it is whether we fill the wit and determination to deal with economic questions, but certainly not limited to them. all things do not flow from all four party. i know this firsthand and soda you. all things flow from doing what is right. >> we have the lowest combined

rate of on and -- inflation, unemployment, and home mortgages in 20 years. look at what happened. 10 million new jobs. over half of them -- 10 million workers getting the raise they deserve with the minimum wage law. >> c-span has aired every minute of every party convention since 1984. now, we are in the countdown to this year's conventions. watch our coverage every minute of the republican and democratic conventions live on c-span, c- span radio, and c-span.org. this is all starting monday, august 27. >> in 11 days, watch coverage of the republican and democratic conventions like here on c-span. continuing our tradition of showing every minute of every major party conventions since 1984. coming up next here on c-span,

"washington journal." at 11:00 a.m., a conference with stephen harbor and angela merkel. at 1:00 p.m., theormer president of the leadership conference of women religious talks about the relationships between u.s. nuns and the vatican. in 45 minutes, dan schnur on his organization's new campaign that helps to ever win the presidency be more effective leader. at 8:30 a.m., we look at for- profit colleges with steve gunderson. then, a discussion of issues facing the self-employed with kristie