[captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> the candidates are back on the trail after the second presidential debate. paul ryan joining the campaign trail today by former secretary of state condoleezza rice. there will be speaking at a rally in ohio, and state that has 18 electoral votes. considered a key battleground state. we will have their remarks live at 11:30. president obama departed the white house about 30 minutes ago for a day full of campaign stops. you will be in mount vernon, iowa. and a rally at 12:45. and mitt romney in virginia today speaking to supporters at time warner community college and chesapeake. -- at tidewater community

college. we are asking the simple question, who won the debate? so far the tally is 9065 think president obama 1. 9062 think mitt romney won the debate. >> i watched two different types of programs. every election year i find myself watching your -- when you show your old convention speeches and all the debates. i think it is a great service to offer. i still have a memory of being 8 years old and watching an old richard nixon speech. for a political junkie like me, that is great. that is wonderful. the fact that you focus on a wide range of public policy issues, there's something for everybody. whether it is national security,

housing policy, something with the economy. i like that you guys cover all of this. >> msohsin watches c-span. brought to you by your television provider. >> no discussion on the ideological makeup of the tea party movement. this was posted at the cato institute yesterday. they used polling data to portray the group as mostly concerned with the size of government. one of the speakers, david of the group freedom works predicted that mitt romney would ,.n the election if he coul this is 90 minutes.

>> good afternoon and welcome to today's event, the libertarian roots of the tea party. the first thing i would like to do is ask everyone to silence their cell phones or any kind of electronic devices that make noise. his if something happens down the line, a surprise. welcome to all of you viewing this event on c-span or streaming. you can join the discussion, and about an hour or so, we will hit the q&a portion of our program using the twitter hashtag #tproots.

information about this can be found that cato.org. if you happen to be watching our event at the first time. to promote free markets, individual liberty, and peace. we support of economic freedom and social freedom. today we will talk about to what extent the tea party movement shares those values. today, we have guessed that brings information to the table that has been missing. that is the libertarian roots of the tea party.

if you are at home, you can go to cato.org endowment a copy for free. -- and download a copy for free. today, we will turn first to david kirby, vice president of development and growing fund- raising operations. he is also an analyst here at the cato institute. he served as the campaign executive for george mason university. and you have interned for senator ted kennedy. [laughter] both of which appear with cato, and cato.org, and now, a libertarian roots of the tea

party. all of the leading national magazines on politics, politico, national review online, and other publications. his research has been sighted at the wall street journal. he holds a master's degree from the kennedy school at harvard. he also has a bachelor's degree in lettering. david? [applause] >> want to start with a story about the matchup of conservatives. i want you to imagine 16,000 people packed in a hockey arena.

two speakers back-to-back tests the ideological boundaries of the audience. the first speaker is a conservative pro-life black baptist minister. he talked to the audience and warned them about the dangers of the progressive policies and entitlements. the crowd went wild. the producer of atlas shrugged part ii, he told the audience about how the central planners

and villains of the novel were coming alive in the obama administration and the crowd went wild. the point is that a conservative pro-life baptist minister and the libertarian hollywood producer can share the stage at a tea party event. the audience is right on. they may disagree on social issues like gay marriage and abortion, but that is not what we are here to talk about. this idea of focusing on this is what bt party is all about. -- what the tea party is all about. but you would not know it. a lot of people on the left think it is a reincarnation of the religious right. but l.a. and i argue that the -- but family and i argue that the -- emily and i argue that the tea party has strong libertarian routes. first, the tea party is have libertarian, and that it helped start the formation.

and that it is changing the libertarian party -- the republican party in a more libertarian direction. it is important to note, many of you have read atlas shrugged. if you were offered the option to say you were libertarian or not, you might say that your libertarian. there is a broader group of people level libertarian believed but never heard the word libertarian. these people can be called socially liberal. they answer questions that are different than liberals or conservatives. this is between 15 and 20% of the american public. if you ask the question of tea party supporters, this chart throws -- shows three national polls in 2010 that looked at the tea party from the new yorkhi

topost, and a as well as to l polls. you e at the tea pars let pretty evenly between people that are libertarian and people that are conservative. libertarian the partyers tend to be more independent. conservative tend to be more loyarepublican voters. issues. libertarians don't attend church as much. it is about what the average of the entire population does whereas many more from the conservative side go to church.

they're worried about the next generation. this is why the key party has remained focused on social issues. the moment you veer off on the social issues, you lose half of your membership. the second argument i want to make is this energy that is part of the tea party. libertarians were mad as hell after eight years of the bush administration. the spending, the war, the erosion of privacy, some libertarians even voted for the democrats in 2004 and 2006. nothing was more frustrating than the bank bailout into a member of 2008 when george bush famously said that we have to save the free market by abandoning it. you will find that this moment

is when libertarian anchor shot through a roof. the increase in spending that they had been making years before. the university of michigan, it is a little different from a normal pull. they start with a group of about 3000 respondents and they follow those voters over two years and ask questions in several different ways along the way. how angry e you th t republican party or george w. bush? in 2010, he asked about the tea party. we can work backwards in time and see where people came from. this chart shows from 2008 to

the beginning of 2009, this next line is libertarian more general at the bottom lines are conservatives and republicans. they were more than twice as at tangry republican pay nt ang.y got more any as 2008 this next slide shows the same pattern. anger towards george w. bush. these bottom lines were tea party conservatives and other republicans. notice that right at september of 2008, that flash point is where anchors like south -- anger spikes up. the final slide might be a little busy, but this traces tea party years from 2008 -- tea partiers and getting at that edgy frustration that

people were describing. they noticednce again that anchors bikes out. -- spikes up. conservatives and other republicans start to join libertarians. we were so frustrated, we got involved, we did whater could. others began to join in the movement. a lot of libertarians joined the party that they helped start. this energy has helped the tea party right from the beginning stay focused on the fiscal issues. the ird argument i wld like

to make is that the tea party is changing the republican party at making it more libertarian. it is now about six and 10 of republican primary voters. first in policy and second in the direction of candidates. some of which included cutting spending, studying the gold standard which is a favorite of libertarians. i found it interesting that politicians are starting to suck up to libertarians. the key party challenge decided to co-sponsor that bill. mitch mcconnell co-hosted ron paul's going away party, even

hired ron paul's campaign manager. ec established politicians coming to the party is. to win the republican primary, the issues we abortion and gay marriage. you see them deemphasized the social issues and win in republican primaries. i call this strategy functionally libertarian. they campaign ever legislate as libertarians would. in the 2010 cycle, i put

senators in the credit -- category. that is not the issue to run on. in conclusion, the tea party has been around for almost four years now. they ask the question if the tea party brand is poison. the data shows this is not true. the washinon post has shown a rprisingly stablbase of tea y supporters and astonishing 42% of the public say they support the tea party. that has been stable. cnn polling has shown an uptick on a savior -- favorability on

the 2012 election cycle. the data shows half of the tea party is libertarian and the energy has kept the focus on fiscal issues. to the extent that ronnie and -- romney and other republican candidates win this election is because they are acting more like the partyers and not less. and these are the very same issues that the majority of americans are concerned about. the tea party brand may fade or it may shift. the impact will likely to be felt for many years to come. thank you. >> among the most well known in

america, speakers will be jonathan. he joined new york university's stern school of business in july of 2011. the professor is the social psychologist, the most recent vote is a new york times best seller, the righteous mind. why good people are divided by politics and religion. the rethink the way business ethics is study. he was taught at 16 years for the outstanding faculty awards. finding modern troupes in ancient wisdom. writings about 10.

-- finding modern truth in ancient wisdom. writings about him appear quite frequently in the new york times and the wall street journal. he received a b.a and an m .a. from the university of pennsylvania. there is -- welcome to cato. [applause] >> i have been here reading and learning about the moral foundations of politics. by jumping off point for today, a line in david and emily's paper.

maybe you or liberal or conservative or in between. they ask the question, what happens if you do? what do you learn if libertarians distinguish themselves from liberals and conservatives. as you see in the paper, there are big differences in the demographic. libertarians are more educated, less religious. you find big differences, but my question is, what kinds of people are ave. personality and politics is the hottest area of political

psychology. that if you take identical more responsive. the personality doesn't dictate your final politics, but it nudges you in one direction or another. all people talk about is liberal and conservative. they are afraid of death, beaten as children, and it is basically all their fault. [laughter] what about libertarians'? there is a good reason to think they will be very different sorts of people.

later, they said these people are not conservatives or republicans, there are radical libertarians. i despise these people. it's not just that they differ on social policy, they are different sorts of people and i happen to run for co run with my colleagues website. people can come, they had about 50 or 70 studies on the site. and when people who come before they get to this page, there register. and unlike most national surveys, we don't first you to say where you are. here is the 1-7 scale, and so the data i will show you today is going to be proving the people that chose very liberal or slightly liberal. or slightly conservative, very conservative.

those will be in the red bars. for people that don't want to pick one of those, which they don't know, not political, or even another. we only want to put people into a box if they willingly put themselves into that box and we will see how their personalities differ. it is not a representative sample, so the numbers can't be taken as the number for this group in america, but the differences are robust. this is 130,000 people, most of whom are liberal, they do lead research mostly. and over sample of libertarians at our side compared to a nationally representative samples. there are overwhelmingly male. what is the issue in your data? about 2/3 are male.

we had about 40 years 50 studies are we to compare liberals, conservatives, and libertarians. he we had to pick about 15 of them. we had about three sets of studies over the common theme. i know she doesn't speak for all libertarians, but she says lots of horrible things, so here is -- quotable things, so here is --o one thing she says about altruism, and the morality of altruism that men have to reject. libertarians reject altruism? that is most of reality, the

hypothesis that libertarians will reject all the low values. here is what we find. it is a question about here, fairness, authority, and sanctity. everything. in the black bars. they are low on care and compassion. there liberal that lack bleeding hearts. at least here, there are low on care and compassion along with the black and red bars. fairness is more about equality. libertarians are like conservatives. when we look to these socially conservative foundations, libertarians are indistinguishable from liberals. they don't care about a sense of sanctity or purity.

all of those are social issues. the bottom line is that libertarians can side with either side. they can say, either side can claim them because they don't fit properly with either side of the one-dimensional spectrum. we realize that liberty is a basic value we did not include in the original set. we did a factor analysis to figure out the different subtypes of liberty. items are up there. we found when we ran these items, they are indeed high on

both of these kinds of liberty. the value lifestyle liberty hall more evenly. they can be together on gay- rights, fighting the drug war. but when it comes to any sort of economic liberty, liberals are very low and where libertarians and conservatives do. these are moral attitudes. let's get more deeply into personality. ayn rand. every culture needs a code of ethics. libertarians are proud of the fact that there are rational, analytical, less swayed by emotion.

it is a personality that comes from simon baron-cohen. he has a bunch of items that will give you a score, the drive to understand the variables in a system and how they govern the behavior of the system. if you understand subway maps, sheets, if you enjoy doing that, it is the drive to identify the of motions another person is to -- experiencing. there is a big sex difference here. men are higher on systematizing and women are higher on that. if you analyze only the men,

libertarian men are the highest of any of the three groups and they are the lowest on empathizing. libertarians are the only group whose scores are higher than their empathizing scores. this reflects a lot of things happening. many point to the feminizing of the democratic party. it has not only got more female, but it has gotten more feminine. there are a whole bunch of other studies, and i can tell you like this. it is a whole year -- a measure of reasoning, we have logic problems were you can get it wrong.

tolerance of ambiguity, libertarians are the highest. there is one exception, won a motion we have measured on which libertarians are higher. items on the scale are things like i find contradicting others -- [laughter] this is my favorite. when something is prohibited, i think that is exactly what i am going to do.

libertarians have the emotional reactions when they manipulate them to go a certain way. very different from social conservatives. if libertarians are more cerebral and less emotional, you think this might impact their relationships and it does. we hypothesized the libertarians would be more individualistic. that is what we find. the major measure is these traits. this is why they encounter each other so option. the traits that are -- they're just like being with people. there are more introverted and not as oriented toward socializing.

how nice, warm, friendly, agreeable. how much you feel the obligations because you need to do things for people. conservatives are the highest. they're pretty close. the gist is, they are curious and open-minded people, they are not focused on getting along with others. this is a little surprising to me. the you have warm and tender feelings for your romantic

partner on the left. the conservatives scored highest on family. that is not surprising in the liberals as were the highest on generic others. they feel compassion and love for general others. they claimed to feel more for other than for their own family. [laughter] libertarians are low on every single one. in summary, there are more than either liberals or conservatives. -- value liberty more.

they rely on reason more and a motion last. they are less connected to other people. they are a very odd couple in the. but they are uniting politically with conservatives nowadays when the tea party because they have a common enemy. and in opposition to the welfare state. it is constantly in frigid on

one person's liberty to give help to another group. the enemy of my enemy is my friend. [applause] >> all you people out there and people in this building, a long- time washington journalists that when the headliner award. he is a scholar at the brookings institution and a contributing editor for national journal and the atlantic. he has written several books. i wonder how many of you have had the experience i have had with this particular book as the person that you feel to be conservative.

i am for gay marriage for the reason that john rolfe puts out on his book, a world where people's minds don't often change, i have remarked of this particular book has had a surprising effect on people that i have come across. he has also written other books including a revised version of an earlier book about why washington has sought work in. in a new attacks on free thought. you also know him from his position on social studies in the national journal. which we all look forward to. he is writing for every publication you can think of. he was raised in arizona. please welcome john.

[laughter] [applause] >> i come to these things for the introductions. thanks especially to david for the marvelous presentation. my job is to modify, where wendy party and merged, one of the -- when the tea party emerged, one of the things heavily debated is it something new? a genuinely independent movement? are they hard-right conservatives, sarah palin? for all they -- are they something new? it is not something we have

seen much of america. if i had to summarize our prior presentations in the headline, a simplistic one that is my job, as a journalist, it would be david saying that he partiers are not monolithic. and there are not lovable. -- they are not loveable. [laughter] when david finds that i think makes his pager landmark is that he put the pieces together. it is about 50% social conservative and 50% libertarian. with the energy waxing and waning, his findings are square with my own.

i decided to go out and because i have that privilege, i can investigate by talking to t parties. tea parties. i am going to amplify what david said by showing you what i found which is awfully relevant. instead of talking primarily about ideology, i would like to talk about brand and style. this is a dimension that i think has not quite been captured yet, there is a sense in which it is distinctive from ordinary disservice. we will begin with a couple of slides where i believe the tea party movement originates. this is a very basic chart,

showing the american electorate by position. here, there doesn't need to be. as you see, these categories are pretty stable over the years. if you are looking carefully, something interesting starts to happen which continues in the 2009 and becomes quite pronounced. this is a phenomenon that i think of as debranding. there are rejecting the conservative label and for some reason or another, thinking of themselves increasingly as independent. another way to look at this grant decline which is hashed out even more clearly, if you

look at party affiliation, qc stability over the 10-year period. for republicans, the second term. the leaders are really gaining market share, but leading republicans in terms of their voting behavior is and political preferences. for some reason, you see this big batch of people were facing the independent label. it is not important, what are these people like? there are a few questions, a lot more this came from. here is what is interesting about this group. it will not surprise you if you

have been listening to david kirby. republicans and republican leaders government has gone too far in regulating business. look at those red lines, the bright red as republican, the light red is independent leading republican. you see this huge rightward shift. and a shift a little bit to the liberal side, independence shifting a little bit to the conservative side. but clearly the giant movement in the electorate is a very sharp rightward movement from republican leaders. independent leaners are swinging harder. they are turning right faster,

and they're winding up to the right of republicans. these are not coincidentally libertarian questions. independent leaners come out to the right. so what is emerging here is a group of political people that are very conservative on economic issues, republicans have shifted very far to the right and do not brand themselves as republicans. if you were a good political analyst in the locker room and -- locked in a room and could

not read any of the headlines and all you could look at was polling data like this, you would say that there must be something out there happening like the tea party. it is clearly what is going on in the political stage. are they just more of the same? republicans and dragged -- in drag? they reject the republican level. -- label. some of my liberal friends still make that case. i disagree with them, but to find out why, you have to look at style as well as substance. often, how you believe is just as important as what you believe it's not even more important. let me give you three important dimensions on with tea with tea partyers are collective on. first, compromise. you admire leaders that stick to their position or make a

compromise. 2010 data has not changed very much, but i have not been able to find a replication of this question. democrats favor a compromise by a quite substantial margin. independents are more on the fence. republicans are very different. they do not like compromise, but look at that the party. that is about as strong as you can get in america, something that looks like a firm consensus. they do not like compromise and they reject politicians that to compromise. they're quite succinctly even from republicans. they will punish politicians that compromise which brings us to dementia and no. 2 on which

they are different. again, these are all data on attitudes toward republican leaders, incumbents, how much you want new faces in government. they all have the willingness to vote for politicians out of loyalty whether to the party or because the politician has been there for a while. yet to vote on watching the incumbent ousted. this data is quite striking to me. in terms of this approval for republican leaners, the energy -- republican leaners, the energy drive look more like democrats than republicans.

they are simply not loyal republicans. do they want their incumbent ousted? you bet. same story. the definition of a partisan is that this is someone that will vote for you even when they think you're wrong. that is what they were saying in 2010. they were a deb on at limit -- on a debt limit without worrying if these guys will punish you, and they will. david illustrated that they have made a collective strategic

decision to prioritize spending over everything else. they may disagree on other things but they don't disagree on spending. i would argue this is a strategic decision. they say this is the strategy. they say that conservative leaders have used social issues as a distraction. and to distract us when they make government bigger. in my opinion, their analysis of what republicans are doing are largely right and they are not falling for it anymore. what we have here is not a movement made up of people that agree with one another or one flavor ideologically, but have come together in a one-flavor movement that are very

independent in their voting patterns. not particularly partisan and quite hostile to the establishment. this gives them a whole lot of potency and the political process and they will continue to have quite a good deal of potency as long as they can sustain their focus, maraniss, determination, and dependents. it is hard to stay that focused. the republicans are working as hard as they possibly can to bring in these folks and turn them in the loyal members of the republican base. very hard to stay outside of the republican machine forever because republicans have a lot of money, political power,

institutional clout, and a lot of ways they can make the tea partyers lives difficult. if i had to predict, i would say that the movement will leave a two-five year movement that will lose its edge as many movements do. i also said that i don't remember having seen anything quite like this before. occupy wall street and moveon.org have similarities but i have not seen anything quite like this with the discipline. i will say that they are not a conventional group or movement. [applause] >> thanks, john. our fourth and final speaker em

theily, the -- will be emily. she leads the poll and public opinion research project. her research focuses primarily on politics, the tea party movement, methodology, and political economy. she studies how expectations of someone's economic future shape their political behavior and attitudes? she has discussed research on fox news, fox business, and her research has appeared in a number of publications. i am proud to say she is a part-time colleague at the cato institute. eimily. [applause] >> thank you, john, for that gracious introduction. today, i would like to make two points. that we have made lots of different points today to get

there are two issues i have found have been overlooked by academics, journalists, and political pundits. this is a great time to set the record straight from what i found in my research as part of my dissertation research. i got in my car and drove around the country to interview local leaders in diners and restaurants. i went to virginia, pennsylvania, kentucky, utah, california. it was surprising how similar the world views of these people were. and so distinct from academic colleagues where i have been getting by phd -- my phd. the first point i would like to make, one thing that sets the tea party apart from many others

is that they have a very traditional view of the american dream. essentially, they have a view that america is the land of opportunity at that old people, regardless of background, can succeed. not to say others don't have this view, but they have this belief even more so. it permeates how they answer poll questions and it explains a lot of their other policy positions that people have a hard time understanding. these are some signs that i took at the washington d.c. tea party protests here by the capital. don't spread my wealth, stop punishing success, this is part of a common theme. for this to make sense, i thought we should go to some polling data.

i will show you a bunch of numbers that i have conducted. i actually have the opportunity to ask americans in general and also a tea partyers how they perceive the fairness of the american system. they are distinct from most other people that do not self identify with the tea party. we see 71% of the party supporters thinking that all americans have an equal opportunity to succeed compared to a majority. we asked about income inequality at the heart of the economic system. 68% of tea partyers say it is an acceptable part of the system compared to less than half of everybody else.

here we see a very huge difference, 80% do not believe it is the role of government to redistribute wealth. this makes sense if you understand the other assumptions, if this is a place for equal opportunity, and reasons why that they should also think it is not the responsibility of government to redistribute wealth. how good of a chance to they have to escape poverty? 57% of tea partyers think poor individuals have a very good chance compared only 33% of non-tea party supporters. 60% think that they have very little chance of escaping

poverty. this is so striking. we have republicans that are not tea partyers, you see almost everyone. republicans, libertarians, democrats, they do not think the poor have a very good chance of escaping from poverty. tea partyers think they do. one of the reasons they feel this way is because we asked about the question of zero sum. can wealth grow for everyone, or does the wealth of one person mean there is less for everybody else? 2/3 think that wealth can grow enough for everyone. less than half of everybody else agrees. the majority of everyone else

think that when one person gets wealthy, it necessarily mean someone else has gotten poorer. most americans agree hard work is the most important trait in order to achieve success. you still see a difference between tea partyers. this is an entrance poll we conducted in 2010 perrier the 97% is basically the margin of error we are talking about. basically everyone believes it is most important for achieving success.

it is overwhelming, there are still sizable percentage as that think that luck and help from other people is ultimately what matters most. this shows you that the key -- tea party members have a very unique view of upward economic mobility in our country. when i did my interview, a common name kept coming up. -- theme kept coming up. people would say, what i am worried about the most is losing the thing that makes america great? what makes america great? america is the place that you can be whatever it is you want to be. they point out that is no guarantee of success. a lot of them havea lot of themd

businesses that have failed but what it does mean is it is the guarantee of opportunity to try. this ideology i had not really encountered with any of the other groups in my own research. it helped explain their other positions and their strong economic conservatism and fiscal conservatism. if you have a of you that things are fair, that we work in a meritocracy and hard work pays off, income redistribution might seem less necessary or even justified. the second point i would like to make today is about medicare. i hear this constantly with my research in the tea party movement. people bring up signs that looks something like this. this was first documented in one of the tea party rallies that she had attended, get your government hands off of my

medicare. his has led to a thesis, an emerging thesis in the academic world. but only big government programs that benefit them. in a sense, it is selfishness. it is just big government programs for them personally. but this did not seem to go with what i was observing. and also looking at the polling data is itself. we decided to build a little bit -- delve a little bit deeper into the issue to understand how he partyers conceive of entitlement programs? we asked about responsibility. who is primarily responsible for saving for retirement? 72% thought that individuals

should be primarily responsible compared to the majority, 56% of non tea-party supporters. we also asked about medicare. and asked about iotut opting ot 3/4 think this is fine. the same is true of medicare. this led me to wonder. tea party ears are unwilling to cut social security and medicare to cut the budget.

why wouldn't it be the movement that says they are against big government spending. what would they impose reducing spending for social security and medicare. would you be willing to have your benefits reduced as part of a plan to balance the budget? a majority say no. one thing that struck me in my interview was that tea party s save this money that they could have saved today but saved it in a government program for

when they are retired. would you be willing to except reductions in your benefit if you're still guaranteed to receive the amount of money you contributed into the system? you see is the response has flipped. 65% say yes if there are guaranteed to get the money back. when you see them and promised to get the money that at least they put in, 67% were open to a cut as long as they got their money back.

poll. we went straight for it. we asked, would you be willing to accept cuts in future benefits if you were guaranteed to receive benefits at least equal to the amount of money you and your employer paid into the system? here we find three-quarters of tea partiers say yes. what we were finding early in the polling data was aspects tea partiers more reluctant to cut medicare spending. what they were thinking was a world of reluctant to have their own savings taken away. -- they were reluctant to have their own savings taken away. more than a seen those as redistributed payment. ok. so, in sum, although the key points are disjointed somewhat, they are very important point. and the polling data can help to clarify where the tea party stands and how it is different from those who do not identify with the tea party. namely, they are very concerned

with support economic mobility, and they continue to be self. -- continue to be so. it indicates there is strong fiscal conservatism, and they are also open to entitlement reform, although we may have previously thought they were not will turn it over for questions. [applause] >> indeed, we will. the question and answers section begins now. let me go over some ground rules. raise your hand and i will call on you. please wait for the microphone and speak into it clearly. we need a microphone so that everyone throughout the room can you as well as for those watching on c-span and on line. for viewers at home, you can submit questions via twitter using the #tproots.

that go to the questions. nt here.n down from her yes. >> my question is, probably to all four, but it was triggered by mr. kirby's response, his remark that he appeared to be the defining libertarians as fiscally conservative and socially liberal. right. i find this kind of undermines what libertarians are. to me, libertarians are essentially saying we do not want government coercion. you can have whatever kind of

personal beliefs you want. you could be someone who likes to live on a commune, but he will not force other people to live on a commune. that makes you a libertarian. my point is, we're putting everybody on the same continuum by describing them this way. in other words, libertarians are on the same continuum as conservatives and liberals, which is probably a reason why they are not identified as a distinctive, group by a lot of people. and what do you think about this criticism? >> i definitely agree with you that libertarians are worried about coercion. but i think the socially liberal part might be hanging you up. the questions that we use to define libertarians as socially liberal are questions like, do you believe the government should promote traditional

volumes or no particular set of values, and to libertarians, by and large pick no part to give their set of values. the government should not be coercing people to those values. i think that is consistent with where you are describing. the socially liberal might be misconstrued when talking about social programs, but i actually i'm talking about more tolerant than they do not want government messing around in their social economics space. conservatism and government staying out of my personal life that define libertarians. i hope that clarifies. >> the gentleman next to him. >> we don't want to start any argument here. >> when you say fiscally responsible, i am a little bit bothered because i think there is a difference between the kind of fiscal responsibility that happens when you keep both spending and taxes low and the

kind of fiscal responsibility that occurs where you do spend a lot of money, but you raise taxes. some of these european countries, and maybe i am wrong about this, but i and -- in italy, for instance, they do have very high taxes. they hope that will offset the effects of a a very high spending. to the extent that i am a libertarian i am very bothered by the idea that it is responsible to raise spending and steal money from people in order to pay for it. >> mm-hmm. >> that is a question for whoever wants to answer it. >> milton friedman famously describes that the measure of taxation is the level of spending. spending today will have to be paid for with future taxes tomorrow. a lot of tea partiers would probably agree with your estimation. it is not right to spend today

and pass on the spending. that might be consistent with the moral intuitions. >> and we also see in the data and -- in the data that tea partiers are also sensitive to the issue of government spending because they see it as future taxation. some people disagree with this. other people do not see that. tea partiers do seem to see this and they are primarily found in part of the income distribution. our research shows they are very sensitive to tax increases because they feel it differently. it is harder for them to pay extra taxes and it is for mr. buffett. but they are getting less than they are paying in in terms of redistribution. and that is exactly where tea partiers fall, generally speaking. that is one of the reasons they are generally averse to

government spending. >> the former chairman of the cato institute, a marvelous man named bill must gannon, he died recently. -- bill musgannon. he did research. i think the evidence conclusively shows that people who want to cut taxes all the time are big government's best friend. they are discounting government services and when you put something on sale, everybody loves it. the best way to balance that is to make everybody pay for it. that means grace taxraise taxes. when you raise taxes, new restrain spending. and the record shows that works the best in the u.s. i could not find polling data on this, but when i went out and talked to tea partiers, i would ask them point-blank cannot wh-- what if you could get very

large reductions in spending -- i asked them point-blank, what if you could get very large reductions in spending and smaller government as a result? they all said no. they were more allergic to raising taxes than they were to having the government grow. i thought that was surprising. you saw that same demand -- a dynamic in the republican primary debate. >> i have not seen the polling data, but my interviews have also come out. typically, data would show that he would favor some sort of compromise there if it were guaranteed that the spending decreases would actually go into effect. and typically, the reluctance to any kind of taxes at all is -- and the kind of tax increase at all is because experience had suggested them. tax increases, if they do go into effect, a strange

accounting tricks happen and they do not seem to materialize. if you were able to pose the question where it was credible, that you credibly cut spending actually, whether or not tea partiers would then favor tax increases, i think it was somewhat mixed. >> in the front row right here. right here. to wait for the microphone, please. >> will martin dale. aarp. i had a question -- a lot of my friends -- i will not speak to my own beliefs, but a lot of my friends jump on the ron paul revolution bandwagon. they jump on largely because of the civil liberties and anti- war rhetoric as opposed to some of the more tax related issues. at our age, we are not really getting taxed either way.

i am wondering if that has a large input in your definition of what a libertarian is. and what that goes into as far as whether those issues, the things in the patriot act, the indefinite detention things, are these issues word about by -- worried about by libertarians or tea partiers? >> to answer your question, we have issued questions about the patriot act. the reason why we do -- the moral background questions are probably more influential in the way people think then knowledge of the issues. a lot of people do not know much about the issues. if you use a background belief questions, you will find libertarian's do care more about civil liberties than

conservatives. there is one question about closing guantanamo bay. it was surprising how many libertarian tea partiers were willing to accept that versus conservatives, who wanted to keep it open. it was sort of surprising. >> the gentleman right here, the one inside. sigyn from the left. -- second from the left. and it will get to the other person. >> jim harpole with the cato institute. i would be happy to hear anyones observations. and what i debate with my friend on the left about regulation, they often use a mental model that if this time we elect the right people and other regulators do it right, we can come up with something good. we have been doing for 40 years now and it has not happened. but what i am recognizing is that there is an aspiration

model that they are using. i wonder if you had come across this in some of your questions, as far as the escaping poverty and being what you want to be. do they think that people can literally escape poverty, and statistically, someone is likely to move up in the u.s., or do they mean aspirational? what is the kind of thinking that you are seeing? >> i'm not glad you asked this question because it gives me an opportunity to clarify -- i am glad you asked this question because it gives me an opportunity to clarify. who doesn't like the word opportunity? what politician does not want and advocate for opportunity? how that is operationalized is different for different people. if we think of starting on the same platform, meaning, some what equalized access to health care and education, and we

start at roughly the same place so that we have an equal opportunity to succeed. this is not about equal results, but just starting equally. tea partiers are not talking about that. the platform. imagine a ladder. they are talking about, if he were to imagine a ladder, they are thinking of the ladder of exports -- upward economic mobility. equality before the law. it is not about where you start, but what is possible for that person. they want a ladder of opportunity to be equal for all people. that means quality before the law. people are treated equally. and typically, equalizing the platform for where you believe -- begin and equalizing the intend to go well together. that is where you get conflicts. tea partiers would care a lot about how the latter work for people. -- ladder. most of them would not think that they would all necessarily

become extraordinarily wealthy. but they would think you could get to a point where you are not struggling, perhaps. and almost the opportunity to try is what matters most. i think there is some basic expectation that although you may not be as wealthy as bill gates, there is some expectation of a level of being comfortable. >> i would just add that we tend to look at history and what is going on in our country in terms of a moral narrative. we tell stories from the past that explain how we got to the present. and there are good guys and bad guys and it is almost like a child's cartoon appeared on th. on the left, it is the bad guys of big business that are raping and pillaging the environment and at least in the port. if we can get the cops in on them, they will control them. we need the right regulators and they will get those bad guys.

my sense from emily with the tea partiers is that there is as much a sense of good and evil as there is with every group. i think we should talk about the role of the poor in being the bad guy. certain groups of poor who commanded the in taba programs --who demanded the entitlement programs. we saw this in the romney 47% comments. the american dream is dying because people have demanded entitlement programs that have sapped the will to work. basically, pushing away the latter. but we do not want that -- pushing away the ladder. we do not want the ladder. who is evil in the narrative? >> i think that goes to the concept that you brought forth, which is proportionality. that is one of your moral foundations. essentially, that actions and consequences should be correlated so that if you make good decisions and work hard, you are rewarded. if you make bad decisions and

you do not work as hard, you are not rewarded. that for the party is the bad guy. it is debatable who else could be included with that. with the financial crisis, the bailout for banks, a bailout for mortgage companies, all of these things infringed on this underlying moral foundation of proportionality, which is central to their idea of the american dream. they think that proportionality is absolutely essential for people to have the freedom to try. with a tarp especially in the financial crisis, that was the enemy. >> that gentleman next. and then jim harper. >> i am with the madison coalition. i saw it in your polling this enormous frustration with politicians in general in the tea party. i wonder if anyone on the panel

has seen any indication that tea party people or republican leaders are interested in the idea of empowering states and making politicians in washington accountable to states, arguably as the authors of the constitution intended, as the solution of some of these problems of growing government power and seemingly uncontrollable government arwin. -- borrowing. >> i hear that all the time that was a major theme among tea partiers that i talked to, but also a source of tension within the movement because the more traditional conservatives do not want to go there. they are worried that the states will make the wrong choices and do what massachusetts did with healthcare. they want more of a top-down, more or less libertarian form of government. this is an area where i found

little agreement. you guys may have more granularity on that. >> one side issue that was popular in a tea party that speaks to this was the direct election of senators. >> yes, the 17th amendment. >> one of the surprising pieces of history where the states have more control over who their senators were then in the past. this has been seen as the solution for many. the rest a lot of interest and talk about the 17th amendment. -- there was an lot of interest about the 17th amendment. >> during 2010 and afterwards, very often this summer i've heard someone say to me that the essence of the tea party is the constitution and the backing of the constitution. do any of you have any comments on this? are they really supporting an originalist idea of the

constitution? >> the single most important idea of the constitution is the document. that is what madison is all about. these guys are hostile to compromise. in that sense, they are somewhat hostile to the idea of the constitution. they do believe in returning government to the people, by which they mean bringing it closer to us. they see these coopting avian -- they see it as coopting from alien forces and interest groups, and in that sense, it is not that different than other populist narrative's. in that sense, i see them closer to the spirit of the jefferson declaration. >> i would add to that the idea of moral psychology. at morality lines and lines. -- binds and blinds.

the idea that you have an idea that you can circle around. you have a fight song, some sacred object. in the golden days, things used to be better. my sense of the constitution and the declaration of independence and the founding fathers are playing this role with the tea party. here is where the libertarians and conservatives might be very helpful conservatives' moral narrative's tend to be stories of declined, that there was a golden age want. -- that there was a golden age once. liberals stories are that everything was always terrible and oppressive and we are fighting to break free of forces of patriarchy. worshiping the constitution is something that both libertarians and conservatives can do for different reasons. looking back to the centuries when times were nobler and more pure, there is no obligation to actually read it. if you are sacralize in a something, you do not need to do scholarship on it.

you can worship the idealization of it. and the people on the left have the idealization of martin luther king, or anybody. do you think the constitution plays a different role for the libertarian tea partiers and the conservative tea partiers? >> i completely agree with your assessment. in the interviews, i heard two different reasons for why the constitution was so important. as you can imagine, most of them brought it up on their own, the constitution. and i heard two different reasons one was the conservative narrative. it was almost a cultural thing. it is part of us. and that makes it good. but then i heard another narrative, which was more kind of -- they would explain to me that that's and bolts, more --

nuts and bolts, more mechanical. the constitution limits what the centralized powers can do, which gives individuals more autonomy. it was more nuts and bolts. any other explanation would be that it would -- it is good because it is the constitution. i clearly related better to be more nuts and bolts the side of it. but what i saw those two stories emerging, i did see that they did correlate quite well with the libertarian half and the conservative half of the tea party. >> the gentleman in the middle here. hard to decide which -- >> and dale johnson, a freelance writer. a question to longevity. i do not see this group of people going away. what i see is if the republicans win and demint and rand paul are successful in

moving the conservatives in the libertarian direction, i could see a lot of the tea partiers peeling off and going home to the republican party, but if mitt romney moves in more of a massachusetts direction where he is compromising and doing a a big more conservatism fit to govern, i see it taking off. especially if the democrats win and continue the trillion dollar deficit. the tea party is just going to grow. i'm not sure in any circumstance i see a five-year life span on it. >> i distinguish between the durability of the sentiments and the individuals and the durability of the movement as an independent movement. and as you say, depends to some extent on what republicans do. if mitt romney is elected and he governs as the mitt romney of the primaries, this group will be very hard to please. their standards are very high

and if he compromises, they will get him. if he becomes the mitt romney of the debate, we are talking george w. bush or worse. if the first thing he does is make a compromise with the democrats, watch out. when i talked to him about this, at least the people in relative leadership roles -- david kirvish talked about this, too. they are well aware that the republican party wants to coopt them. their argument is that they got coopted what did before. their argument is that it will stay outside and we will keep a close eye on them so we are always prepared to hit them. that is hard to do. that is hard to do. >> many tea partiers look at the senate as a sort of insurance policy. there are a lot of battles

where rand paul type candidates are running. if they can win a tea party caucus and work as strategy, and only put bills on mitt romney's desk that would force his hand, he would veto them, but he -- he would not veto them, but he probably would not drive it as far as those folks. the budget might look more like what rand paul proposes rather than what mitt romney proposes. >> and to the extent that any kind of social movement can create an institution that is durable will indicate what is left. -- the longer they will last. with the occupy wall street, we did not see this local level where they tried to take over local level offices. the tea party did this.

i did not see the same kind of activity. the tea partwent v local levels proved a lot of times, you did not see it. uz out ofthat ted ews out texas won the nomination for the repuan party is because of the group that localized at the level -- the local level kind o under the radar. polls showed that his oppent, david duke verse, was leading in the polls. avid dewrst. and d cruz swebecausef day, those institutions that had erriblreatedhat were te. however, if theyave nond i do not know ere they have and where they ve not, bu where they haot, i would suspect a waning of a tea party activity. t ev if peoplere not organizing, that does not mean the sentiment is not there. it is question of the tea party movement is almost like the occupy wl reet movement. it is a way dentify unique set of views that you do not get if you just say you are

republican or a democrat or a liberal, tory libertarian or whatever. i think that will continue to be neutral. >> that has already answered one of the questions that we received from one of our viewers over twitter. that is, the differences and similarities between the tea party activists and the occupied movement. anyone else that has a comment about the differences or similarities and? >> i will start. emily and i visited occupy together about a year ago. and in terms of the moral foundations that i presented, they are very skeptical of crony capitalism. they could make common cause on a number of substantive issues,

but their styles could not be more different the best way to say it is, the three moral foundations that bind the groups together -- group loyalty, respect for authority, and a sense of purity. those are the three that the social conservatives have that both the libertarians and others do not. when a group is under threat, these are really useful foundations. it is one for all and all for one. hang in there and fight them off. the tea party have that. the moral foundations. at least the social conservatives have that. what we saw with occupies that they are so anti- hierarchical. and they are given to boundaries and exclusions. if you are not going to discriminate and keep some people out and keep some people in, they are very opposed to the word hierarchical and those

structures, they do not work very well. we have seen a lot of discussions evolved into arguments about procedure and people speaking out of turn. it is very hard if you do not have some sort of sense of authority and discipline. the organizations are structured extremely different. the occupied folks just have a lot more trouble creating durable structures that could move out of reflection and discussion and out into the world. they are similar in terms of the moral narrative. you have the force in america that is perverting and corrupted the country. they disagree about what that is. government, and occupy wall street says it is unbridled capitalism.

but there is a similarity in the populist narrative, a very important -- populist narrative. a very important difference, of which the politicians are aware, the tea partiers have narrowed their focus. they knew what they want and they know what they do not want. occupied still does not know what they want. and in politics, if you do not get together, you do not get what you want. >> one final question from home. >> a person would like to know via twitter whether the tea party was more libertarian when it started, and if that is so, why has changed. >> let me show you a slide that -- emily and i took 12 polls between 2011 and 2012 and tried to see which percentage of tea partiers were libertarian. we averaged out a trend. though starting in 2010 have the highest percentage of

libertarian. it was sort of 50-50. and then it started to decline. then it started to come back in 2012. they got a little frustrated when other people got involved. you described a penchant for not being very cooperative with others. they did not like their parents very much. it certainly will not like other people getting involved in their thing. some took their marbles and went home. [laughter] interestingly, they seem to come back in 2012. maybe this is in part because the ron paul campaign and got going in force. it started from there. the interesting question about longevity is, where the -- where do these ron paul people go now that he has retired? they might have left the tea party. now they are back in.

does that give energy to the tea party and combine to make a brand that is bigger and broader than just the tea party that is more activist and it is just as big matchup? -- mashup. it is an open question. a lot of scholars will look at the tea party and say it is conservative. but one indication that this -- but one implication in this trend is trend is at a low point is that if you take 2011 as the time you will study the tea party, you might actually be studying it at a low point of libertarian party is a patient. you might be fooled into thinking it is a very conservative leaning group. because the data shows that if you look at the whole trend from the beginning through 2012, you see the end and flow of -- ebb and flow of libertarian participation. >> on that note, you -- i would like to thank our panelists for coming. and i would like to invite

everyone out into the lobby for the reception. if you're looking for a restaurant, and you are on the -- rest room, second floor, look for a yellow stripe. thank you for coming today. [applause] national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> the campaign is back in full swing. paul ryan will be appearing at a rally sharply in ohio, joined by condoleezza rice. it will get underway shortly. president obama stopping in ohio and iowa. we will have his remarks live

it 12:45. mitt romney is in virginia and that is set to go live at 1:15. we'll take it is some reaction from viewers this morning. host: a narrow win for obama. obama outperformed expectations in the second. 73% of respondents said he did better. 16% said he did about the same as expected.

37% said he did better than expected. 28% said worse. romeny performed better -- romney did better. 49% said romney did. 38% said obama did. that is from "the huffington post." this is a cbs news poll. 37% said obama won the debate. 33% said it was a tie. on the"roll call" take debate.

host: first call is from springfield, virginia. good morning to you. caller: good morning. this is the first time i have called an ever. in ever. i thought it was a great debate.

i was so excited to see president obama come out swinging. i thought mitt romney did well with points on the economy. i felt the president held his own in that regard. the most important points were the issues -- the women's issues and on immigration. i'm from the dominican republican have been a citizen since 1973. i feel that is an important issue. i was glad to see those issues come up last night. host: what do think of the campaign commercials that we're seeing in the washington area? caller: i think it is overkill. they come on and i switched channels or newmute.

i have heard as much as i want to hear. host: what kind of work do you do? caller: i was a public-school teacher and i retired. i'm a disabled. i was able to use some of the services for retraining. i became a social service worker and i've been doing social service work for the last seven to 10 years. my disability became too much to handle. now i do free-lance work and spending time with my grandchild and having a great

life. host: thanks for calling. mark in germantown, maryland, on our support romney line. good morning. caller: good morning. i thought they both did very well in their presentations, but the american voters just don't understand where we're headed. we are clearly a nation in decline. if obama wins again and we have $20 trillion in debt, that's really like $100 trillion plus in unfunded liabilities. we are going to have street riots and a lot of angry people down the road. i don't think americans really get that yet. they will get it in 20 years. host: why are we going to have street riots? caller: we will continue to be a nation in decline. our debt are continuing to mount.

nobody in washington can stop this. what's going to happen ultimately is we are not calling -- going to be able to afford all of these -- the american government does wonderful things for people. believe me. i am on food stamps myself. and i understand there are times when we need these things. but when we become more and more bankrupt, which we already are, we will begin to afford these things less and less. anyway, that's what i feel is happening ultimately is that obama does not understand and the american voters don't understand that clearly. host: from the hill newspaper --

host: next call comes from tonya in martinsburg, west virginia, on our independent or others line. hi, tanya. caller: good morning. i did not like president obama's answer when it came to the ak-47's. the man in colorado had just left medical school, so he had access to great education.

and the fort hood shooter was a psychiatrist. he had access to a great education. the white supremacist who shot up the indian temple, he had access to great education. for president obama to throw that in the black community like the black community was the mass murder, i found offensive. i wish somebody would ask president obama, after defunding social security with the payroll tax, what kind of changes does he plan to make the social security? now he wants to tweak social security. what does that mean? i want to tweet it. host: and that was tonya in

martinsburg. "usa today" this morning -- here's a little from susan page's article --

host: that's just a little bit from "usa today." the last question that was asked of the candidates was on

misconceptions of them. d to say.at they have to say [video clip] >> a tough question. each of you, what do you believe is the biggest misperceptions the american people have about you as a man and a candidate? can you take this opportunity to debunk that misperception and set us straight? >> thank you. that's an opportunity for me and i appreciate it. the nature of a campaign, it seems that some campaigns are focused on attacking a person rather than prescribing the things they would like to do. in the course of that, the president's campaign has tried to characterize me as someone who's very different than who i am. i care about 100% of the american people and i want them to have a bright and prosperous future. i care about our kids. i understand what it takes to

make a bright and prosperous future for america again. i spent my life in the private sector, not in government. i am a guy who wants to help with the experience i have, the american people. my passion flows from the fact i believe in god and i believe we are all children of the same god. i believe we have a responsibility to care for one another. i served as a missionary for my church and as a pastor in my congregation for about 10 years if. i sat across the table from people out of work and work with them to try to find work and help them through tough times if. i went to the olympics when there were in trouble to try to get them on track. as governor, i was able to get 100% of my people insured, all my kids, 98% of the adults. was able to get our schools ranked no. 1 in the nation so write opportunity for their future. >> i think a lot of this campaign and may be over the

last of all your years have been devoted to the notion i think government creates jobs, that that is somehow the answer. that's not what i believe. i believe the free enterprise system is the greatest engine of prosperity the world as ever known. i believe in self-reliance and individual initiative and risk takers being rewarded. i also believe that everybody should have a fair shot and everybody should do their fair share and everybody should play by the same rules, because that is how our economy is grown. that is how we have the world's greatest middle-class. that is part of what is at stake in this election. there is a fundamentally different vision about how we move our country forward. i believe governor romney is a good man, loves his family, cares about his faith. but i also believe when he said

behind closed doors that 47% of the country consider themselves victims who refused personal responsibility, wh,o he was -- think about who he was talking about. people on social security who have worked all their lives, veterans who sacrificed for this country, students out there and trying to advance their own dreams but also this country's dreams, soldiers overseas fighting for us right now, people who are working hard every day paying payroll tax, gas taxes, but don't make enough income. host: back to your calls this morning. your reaction to last night's presidential debate. cindy is a supporter of mitt romney in texas. good morning. caller: actually i'm in north richland hills. i'm a democrat voting for romney. i believe the people on the democratic side, the ones that are undecided, when obama is

talking, he is saying what we will do and what we need to do. he has always stated once what he's actually done, which is funding the bill for women to have a fair wage. he never even followed up on that on the details. the always gives out lines and not details. what got me really upset and has most supporters going for romney is the fact that he threw hillary under the bus again. he went the next day to las vegas and did it during a campaign speech instead of having the guts to be in front of the news people and take questions like she did. she's the one taking the questions. not him. he's doing it in front of his people. that is not leadership. the democrats need to cut their losses and look at the congress

and look at regaining congress. this guy is not a leader. he's an embarrassment to the democratic party. host: and this in the wall street journal --

host: that is "the wall street journal." john is in arlington, virginia, on our others line. caller: the consensus is the president did better last night. i'm bothered by this libyan business. i don't think the debate last night really got into it well. i think the moderator tried to make a point and ended up saying that the president said something on terrorism in the news conference. it was kind of general and not specific, on benghazi. but the real issue is now that when the secretary of state says, i have all these details and i'm the one responsible for getting new aid to our post overseas and the president might not know all the details on this, what in the world goes on in their national security

briefings? the president is supposed to get this every day. was he not told there was a series of attacks against diplomatic and other posts in benghazi? did he ask the question are we getting more support so we have protection for our people in benghazi? if he did not get that information, it was not good on the part of the briefers. exceeded not asked the secretary -- if he did not ask the secretary of state of getting more protection for our people in benghazi, that was incompetency. i don't think it looks good. it results from the politicization of the whole thing, which is a problem for both sides, unfortunately. and i think the governor romney started down the road of making a little more detail on his economic proposals. that has to get a little better. i think he did an ok job. i think he was effective in outlying greedy outlining the failures of the president.

on the other hand, the president said that he really had the private sector involved in some of his reforms, whether it was gm or either the medical thing. that was done through cooperation with the private sector. >> all of today's "washington journal" in the c-span library. rob portman introducing condoleezza rice at a rally for vice presidential candidate paul ryan. >> we need to be sure we elect these guys to turn this country around to get the country back on track. [cheers] and mitt romney has a terrific partner in paul ryan, it does doesn't he?

heat that vision that mitt romney laid out last night -- is out of the campaign trail talking about it every day. he understands america faces serious problems and they are no laughing matter. that is why he did well in his debate against joe biden. representing you in the senate, i cannot wait to work with paul ryan as the next vice president of the united states. we are blessed to have another star with us today. [cheers] she is one of my favorite people in the world it respected public figure. she made us proud with her

speech at the republican national convention in tampa. she also makes all the browns' fans here proud. the only place she would rather be in here with you is that the dog pound. she is an undying, loyal cleveland browns fan. welcome, former secretary of state, condoleezza rice. [applause] >> thank you. thank you. thank you. thank you. thank you. well, thank you very much. thank you. thank you.

well, thank you so much for that warm welcome to baldwin wallace university. i have to start by saying go jackets. [laughter] [applause] i would like to thank my friend and wonderful senator, rob port man. thank you for all you do for your country. and you cannot find up finer public servant than rob portman. thank you. [applause] now, it is true i am going to go see the cleveland browns to by my count won the game last week. who by my count won the game last week. but that is not why i am here. i want, like you, to see this

country prosper and continue to be a place of unlimited opportunity. to see this country lead the world toward prosperity and liberty and peace. and so i am here to support mitt romney and paul ryan in that quest. this is a pivotal time in our country's history. we are at a crossroads, ladies and gentlemen. we are at a crossroads about what kind of country we are going to be and whether you and i, who have benefited so much from what our ancestors gave us, are going to pass on that same country of liberty and opportunity to our children. and that is what this election is about. [applause] we are at a crossroads because

we cannot continue to spend money that we cannot afford to pay back and therefore, will saddle our children with the deaths we have taken on. we just cannot afford that. -- with the debts we have taken on. we cannot afford to be a country where so many men, and especially so many women, in these hard economic times do not know if there will ever work again. indeed, americans are feeling this terrible economic tension and pain. it has been a rough decade or so. 9/11 changed our conception of physical security. the crisis of 2008 changed our conception of economic prosperity, and the past four years have been very tough on folks who just want to work hard and make a living. when i was a little girl i

remember my grandfather saying to my mother, angelina, you and john have to buy a house as soon as you can, because the value of your home never goes down. but americans have watched as this most prized assets, the value of their home, has indeed gone down. many americans out of work wonder if they will ever work again. they have reason to work where jobs are being created so slowly -- they have reason to worry where jobs are being created so slowly. the longer you are out of work, the less likely you are to find a job. when mitt romney and paul ryan said they're going to put the country back to work, this is an urgent call, not one for which we can wait another four years. [applause]

but you know as important as it is for us to pay our bills and not take on debt as we could -- not take on debt that we cannot afford, as important as it is to get people's sense of hope again, i want to make one other argument. i want to say one other thing. when you were secretary of state you get to go around the world and see what this great country means to the world. you get to see what people do not particularly like about us, but you also get to see how admired america is for its central belief that it does not matter where you came from, in matters where you are going. now, across the world, people look to the united states for strength. they look to the united states to keep the peace, and by the way, we have to be each turn of the grateful that we have men and women in uniform who volunteer --e volunteey

[applause] and we have kept the strength, the peace through strength, but we also given the world hope so that people have come here from all over the world to be a part of the believe that it does not matter where you came from but matters where you are going. people here have never been trapped in their view of class as a prison. we've never been envious of one another, and we've certainly een envious of one another's success. [applause] instead, we of been a country of opportunity and hope. as i stand here at this wonderful university i am reminded that so much of that

sense of opportunity and hope and possibility comes with a good education that can transform who you are and what you might be. i have to tell you, we all have our family heroes, and one of mine and ours is my grandfather on my father's side, a man named john wesley rice senior. when he was a sharecropper's son in utah, alabama, he decided he was going to get book learning in a college. he asked people how could a colored man go to college? he said they have this little presbyterian college 30 miles from here. you could go there. he went and met for one year. he said i am out of cotton, so you are out of luck. my grandfather said so how are those boys going to college? he said they have what you call

a colored -- scholarship. he said if you want to be a presbyterian minister, you can get a scholarship, too. my grandfather said that is exactly what i have in mind. [applause] and my family has been college educated and presbyterian ever sense. the transforming power of education that these young people are experiencing here at this find university is a wonderful thing of itself, but i want them when they leave here to be able to take part in the prosperity of an economy that works the way you and i do. that is also what this election is about, and that is being watched across the world, because of their current needs to lead from strength, but america -- because america needs to lead from strength and needs to leap from the use and principals, and america needs to feel confident and values and

principles so that we want to lead. [applause] that principle but it does not matter where you came from, goingt matters where you are has always meant we are not the people that is constantly agreed. we did not give way to agreement twin brothers entitlement, why not stay giv don't they give me- [applause] instead, no matter are circumstances at birth, we believe the that with a chance we would succeed. we might not be able to control our circumstances, but we could control our response and look at what we build for the united states of america. that is what this election is about. that is what this pivotal time

in our history is about. that is why we are at a crossroads. we are at a crossroads in so many fronts. jobs for our people. yes, on equality for men and women to have the same opportunity to succeed. this is a powerful country that has been a powerful force for peace and liberty in this world. i want to see it be that way well into the future. sometimes it seems the task before us is just too hard, but i want to remind you, as i said to the nation at the republican convention, that americans have had a way making the impossible seen -- seem inevitable in retrospect. the united states went by grants the greatest military of the time. and then we've fought the civil

war, brother against brother. hundreds of thousands dead on both sides and reemerged a more perfect union. where i live you think about the people who came across there in the covered wagons. they had to be optimistic, because they did not even know what was on the other side and kept rolling -- kept going anyway. a girl grows up in alabama it cannot go to a movie theater or restaurant but her parents were convinced you could become president of the united states of america. to become secretary of state. [applause] -- she becomes secretary of state. [cheers and appluse] ause] america has been the place that make the impossible seem inevitable in retrospect. it took courage and vision, and that is why i am so proud to be

here today, because i know we are all going to work very hard to make sure that vision and that leadership and that integrity that we see in mitt romney and paul ryan is available to america in these troubled times. [applause] and so it is a great honor and great privilege to ask to join me on stage, the congressman from wisconsin and future vice president of the united states, paul ryan. [cheers and applause] ♪

♪ >> thank you. [applause] what an example. if you want to see the embodiment of the american idea, look no further than this leader off of my right shoulder, condoleezza rice. [applause]

if you want to see what a cable -- capable and consciences leader looks like from wisconsin wisconsin look no further than my left shoulder. i also want to say thank you to shaper. [applause] look, bw thanks for hosting us here today. good jacket. we really appreciate it. -- go jackets. the three of us get to go see the grounds later today. i got to tell you, here is one thing i wanted it, i want to be joe thomas. this is a guy from our neck of

the woods in wisconsin. i watched him play college ball. he is a fantastic tackle. a great guy. nice going last sunday. all right? [applause] i am a mime -- miami of ohio graduate. i remember during those years my friends from cincinnati and cleveland would not talk to each other at least twice a year, and it is great to see these old rivalries. to a greatt romney job for us last night? -- do a great job for us last night? [applause] you know, this is my second time following condoleezza rice. it is a little intimidating. a tough act to follow. mitt romney had a fantastic first debate. he laid out a vision for the country.

we were able to cut through the clutter of all the 30-second attack ads and saw a leader. last night, same thing. cut through the clutter of all the attack ads, and what did we see? we saw a president offering not a single new idea on how to turn things around. we saw a president not offer a single idea or lesson learned from the failures of the last four years. what we saw in it romney was a leader who has the solutions, ideas on how to turn this economy around. how to get people back to work, and how to get america back on the right track, and that is what we're going to do on november 6 right here in ohio. we're going to recognize the leadership and make mitt romney the next president of the united states. [cheers and applause] here is president obama's

problem. his economic agenda failed not because it was stopped. it failed because it was passed. [laughter] he came in with one-party rule. the ability to do everything of his own choosing, and he did, and look at where we are right now. 23 million americans struggling to find work. we had a discussion about how women are bearing in this economy last night. -- fairing in this economy last night. 5.5 million are still struggling for work in this economy. a half-million more are unemployed today than when president obama was sworn in. 26 million are trapped in poverty, the highest rates in 17 years. we need to get people back to work. we need to get this economy turned around. the american idea is there. it has not gone away, but we

have the wrong people and the wrong policies in place, and if we clear the way and go forward with a pro-active, pro-growth solution to the agenda mitt romney is talking about, we will get people back to work and out of poverty and back in the middle class. [applause] do know, somewhere out there on the horizon is a dream that you have for yourself, for your children. lately too many people it seems like it is getting more distant. it is still there. we need leadership. thank you, ma'am. one of my favorite historians passed a week -- past wait a week ago. he would often say great leaders

step up in the important moments. condoleezza rice just explained how important this very moment is. you see, this is not just an election where we're picking a president for four more years. it really does not matter what generation you come from, this is the most important election in your generation, because we are not just deciding who was born to be in washington for few years, we are deciding what kind of country we are born to be and what kind of people we are going to be. the american idea is there. in a nutshell, it does not matter who you are, where you come from, under what circumstances you got here or were born, you could make the most of your life. the only thing limiting you in this free society and free economy is your own god-given talent and hard work and effort. [applause] you can see what ever you want to be in this country. we need to remove the barrier so

people can have the right to rise. so people can get out of poverty and make the most of their lives. when you see these ideas coming from the president. when you see all the borrowing and spending and regulating and the money printing it just does not work. if you want to see what this movie looks like at the end of the movie, go home, turn on the tv and look at europe. they are already in a debt crisis. they have already kicked the can so far down the road there is no more road to kick the can down. here is what happened. generations of politicians made a lot of empty promises to voters to get elected, and now that the debt crisis has hit them, those and the prices -- promises are broken promises. they are slashing health and retirement benefits for current retirees, cranking up taxes, going into recession. young people have no

opportunities. the youth unemployment rate is about 20%. in greece and spain it is over 50 percent. right now, look at this great institution we are at. right now half of college graduates are either not working in this sector they trained for it or even working at all. that is unacceptable. we do not have to settle for this. they made -- this may be the best president obama can give bestut thit is not the we can give ourselves. [applause] and what history shows is the qualities that make a great leader at this kind of moment are these. a person with a moral compass. a person with a bedrock of principles.

a person with a vision for the future and the ability and skills to execute the vision. ladies and gentlemen, that is mitt romney. that is exactly what we saw last night. that is exactly what we saw two weeks ago, and exactly the man we will see on november the seventh. [applause] this is a man who has succeeded in some areas where others have failed. this is a man where when his country calls and asks him to help support the olympics in turnaround, he did that. this is a man throughout his career has learned exactly what it takes to create jobs. turning around struggling businesses. starting successful businesses. businesses we know like sports authority, staples, steel dynamics. by the way, being successful in business is a good thing. there is nothing wrong with that. that is something we all take pride in.

we do not and the other people's success, we want to emulate other people's success. we want more people to become successful. that is freedom. that is free enterprise. that is the american dream. [applause] so when we see a president speak to our darker emotions of fear, envy, and anxiety, that is not what we do in this country. that is not how you win elections. you see the president cannot run on his record. it is a terrible record. we have a debt crisis staring us in the face, and he is given us nothing with for budgets with trillion dollar deficits every year and no solutions. we have so many people struggling to find work. 5.5 million people to stop trying. if we actually count of those people who stopped looking for work the unemployment rate would be closer to 11%.

we can do better than this. when mitt romney was governor of massachusetts -- this is a republican governor of a democratic state, 87 percent of the legislature's he served with were democrats. did you demean them or ridicule them? no. -- did he mean them or ridicule them? he met with them every monday and he found common ground and got things done. the balance the budget without raising taxes. he lowered unemployment. the bond rating went up. unemployment went down. that is precisely the kind of leadership we need today. [applause] you look at what the president is proposing. he basically has one new idea, raise taxes even more. raise taxes on successful small businesses so we're taxing at over 40 percent. we are not -- our competitors

overseas are taxing at 25% or less. here in the midwest where we come from, here in big 10 country most of the businesses, from small businesses. most of the jobs come from small businesses. overseas where i come from means lake superior. the canadiens just a word their tax rate to 15%. he wants the tax rate on small businesses, the ones that create small businesses to go above 40? it does not even pay for 10 percent of his proposed deficit spending. all of this borrowing and interest is going to amount to a $4,000 tax increase on middle class families. remember when he said if you are in the middle income you make less than two under $50,000 per year, no tax increases on my what? of the 21 tax increases in obama care, 12 hit the middle class. he said he would cut the deficit in half in four years.

wrong. he said he would bring people together to solve the country's biggest problems. look, the other day on tv the president said i cannot change washington from inside. [laughter] isn't that why we elect presidents? if he cannot change washington, it is time we change presidents. [applause] what mitt and i owe you is a pair -- are really clear choice. that is our obligation. it is not enough for us to complain or criticize, but to offer solutions. you heard that last night. our five-point plan are specific solutions to get people back to work, to get the economy

reaching its potential, to create 12 million jobs. we have so much energy in a hot meal, let's use the energy and create jobs. -- right here in ohio, let's use the energy and create jobs. [applause] let's help the workers in between jobs get the skills they need and help the kids in our inner cities get out of the schools that are trapping them in poverty and give them a good education so they can get on with their lives. cut spending. balance the budget and stop the washington knows best and we can keep spending money we do not have. let's champion of small businesses. this is bigger than that. this just is not getting jobs. it just isn't creating energy. it is bigger than that. america, it is an idea. it is not just a country with a

flag. it is not just wisconsin or ohio or california or maine, it is an idea. you know, it is the only country founded on an idea. the idea is really clear. thomas jefferson said it so well in the declaration of independence. our rights come from nature and nature's god, not from government. that is the answer to the american idea. [applause] our founders established this. i see cheese heads all over. it makes me hungry sometimes when i see that. i see veterans here. the veterans of this country put on the uniform and serve our nation and secured each and every generation, and we thank them for that. [applause]

please do not forget early voting. ohians have a unique responsibility. you are the battleground of the battleground states. you are used to it. you know this. that is why you are here. you have a unique responsibility and opportunity and obligation to make sure that we secure our future, that we look back at this moment as the moment we got things right. winston churchill probably said it best. the americans can be counted upon to do the right thing, but only after they have exhausted all the other possibilities. [laughter] i kind of think of that as the moment we're at right now. mayor ronnie and i are pledging this -- mitt romney and i are pledging this. we will reclaim the principles that made as great.

we will lead and fix this mess in washington. we are not want to spend the next four years blaming others. we are going to take responsibility. [applause] of all things we are not going to try to transform this country into something was never intended to be. we will not replace our founding principles. we will reapply our founding principles. we have leaders ready to leave. we're not going to need to be saved. we a country headed in the wrong direction that can be taken on the right track. it is not too late to get this done thank you so much for coming out today. thank you for what you have done. do not forget to early boats. -- early vote.

thank you everybody. thank you so much. appreciate it. [applause] >> we meant to bring you the love predict the rest of the coverage but we lost the signal obviously. we can tell you we're going to bring the president live from mount vernon, iowa. it is scheduled to start at

12:45 eastern. also this afternoon, mitt romney will campaign in chesapeake, virginia. he is at tidewater community college scheduled to start at 1:15. we've been looking at the facebook page asking the question, who won last night's debate, the second presidential debate? so far the tally is 17,830 people voting for barack obama. it can thousand 476 people for mitt romney. cast your vote at tht facebook.com/cspan. we have c-span be worse with the thought of the presidential debate. -- viewers. >> every time the chance went to -- the chance went to prison know what he was blamed the other individual and never said what he wanted to do. healy said his opponent was doing this in was not doing

that, and he never said what he would do. he always wanted to show the fault on everyone else. >> mitt romney always wants to comment on what the president is doing wrong. i think the president is doing a fine job. first of all, at the end when president obama went over to shake mitt romney's hand, he went back and would not even shake the man's hand, and i think that is very disrespectful. >> every debate that goes on becomes more and more caricature. we cannot get to specifics. we seem to be approached more and more with trying to 1-up the other candidates. tonight was disappointing to me. >> romney in particular seem to be dodging a lot of questions by talking about what the main was on, but not answer

and the full question. has completelyama -- there is the president's has completely embarrassed the presidency. he cannot even look mitt romney in that i would ask a direct question. to >> president and this time dd act more of the president. he did get out of hand at times. i think he did it in more of a leadership role. >> i think the moderator in this debate did a lot better than in the last presidential debate with keeping order and all that, but i think president obama keeps trying to play the blame game instead of going on his record. to go i have never seen a debate where the moderator and dexter

thought to determine the outcome. she basically told it wrongly he was a lawyer basically on what the president said about terrorism when it clearly the statement was because of some cartoon character drawing of the profit mohammed and the crowd started clapping. i thought that was unusual to interject yourself. >> i watched the debate and watch it very intently. i walked away once again thinking that mitt romney has never laid out any specifics. it is one thing to come up with the grandiose notions and place blame, but even when the moderator asked him to be more specific, he just could not. he just kept repeating what to me and the people i was watching

with sounded like scripted answers. >> he asked obama about the pension. he would always turn the other way. he would not answer any questions straight out. >> it is really wild to hear mitt romney say government cannot create jobs after he spent so much time arguing the president was responsible for not creating jobs. he has to say it one way or another. >> i am with mitt romney. he seemed to teeter on at the end. >> the answer the questions. quit selling up -- telling me what the other guy is not doing. i feel like we're not holding them accountable. we sit there and believe it. i believe if you are set on one

candidate or the other, something is wrong. they're both going down the same road. tell me what you are going to do and let us make the decision. >> as we follow the candidates on the road to the white house, watch and engage with c-span. >> one day after the debate last night, the campaigns back on the campaign trail. vernon, iowa.rninmt. president obama is scheduled to speak at 12:45 eastern. just a short while ago, the state senator spoke to the crowd. ♪

>> what a great crowd. my goodness. it takes my breath away so many people came here just to see me? hard to believe. anyway, i know i am the warm-up act. after last night's debate performance, barack obama does not need any more warm-up. i will tell you that. [applause] he was great, wasn't he?

[applause] i am glad to be here. also with two of my colleagues, my colleague who is a professor here for years and years. you will hear shortly from your new congressman, congressman bruce really. i just want you to know how hard we of all work together to make sure after the disaster 2008 that when county in johnson county and people up and down the river got rebuilt. i want you to know their work very hard on getting all the material out here and rebuilding in iowa city in cedar rapids.

i always loved being on this beautiful campus. cornell is famous for its unique one course at a time approach. [applause] 3.5 weeks of concentrated focus on a single subject. well, for all of us who believe in a positive progressive inclusive america i want you to sign up for one all-important course over the next few weeks. that course is called reelect president obama and keep america moving forward. [applause] are you signed up? [applause] ok. here is the syllabus. register to vote in both early. -- and vote early. make sure your friends and

family are registered to vote and are voting. we need every single vote out by the election day. [applause] we know the stakes are sky high. our nation faces a fundamental choice. are we going to rescue and restore and rebuild the middle class, or will we continue to shift even more wealth, more advantages to those at the top at the expense of the middle class? ito is put it more succinctly. we know you do not fertilize a tree from the top down. he put it in at the roots. [applause] that is where we need to fertilize. we have come so far in the past four years. think about it, health care reform for the first time in our history.

the first bill president obama signed into law, and i was there when he signed it, the lee ledbetter pay fair act for women -- fair pay act for women. the dodd-frank act, final we getting a handle on those speculators on wall street. rescuing the auto industry. ending the iraq war. expanding pell grants. repealing do not ask, do not tell. [applause] advancing marriage equality for all of our citizens.

president obama has plans to create an even brighter future for our young people investing in education. clean energy and manufacturing. let me digress for a moment here. i listened to the debate last night, and every time i listen to mitt romney on energy it seems like he has of 19th century vision of america. outestack's belching columns of smoke. sulfur, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide causing acid rain and more greenhouse gas emissions, further degrading our environment. his philosophy on energy is the same as it is in capitalism, unbridled capitalism. it is sort of like tabanid capital, make as much money in a short amount of time as quickly as you can, do not worry about what is down the road. and-- sort of like bain capital.

i can tell you barack obama and i and congressman losec and ngressman braily believe we have an obligation to the young people here in europeans and our grandkids to leave this planet cleaner and more sustainable than what we found it. [applause] we can produce all the energy we need for the future, and we can do it cleaner and with more efficiency, with wind and solar and geothermal and all the other things. we just need a president who will lead the way, and that is barack obama leading the way. [applause]

the choice, the choice is stark when it comes to education. as you all know, mitt romney and paul ryan see things differently. they want to slash funding for pell grants. they want to ship the money to huge new tax cuts for the wealthiest americans. not to worry, not to worry, mitt romney and paul ryan did not leave you without options. as mitt romney put it recently, and you want to go to college or start a business, then if you can just borrow money from your parents. [laughter] of didn't you all think that? you mean your dad is not the president and ceo of a major automobile company? or like paul ryan, your family owns a big construction company?

i get the vision he was born on third base and thinks he hit a triple. [laughter] [applause] so is your like families that barack obama came from and i came from, we could not borrow money from our parents because they did not have any. we cannot go to college without help grants and student loans. this election has big stakes for all of you students. today we have a message for mitt romney and paul ryan. this is america. we believe everyone should have a fair shot at a college education in this country. [applause]

we believe the pell grants are not to be slashed but are an investment in our young people in strong future. we say to mitt romney and paul ryan, more tax cuts for the rich is that policy, bad choices and just plain bad values. my friends and all the students here at cornell, i know you are studying serious things here at cornell, but there is one thing i want to leave you with. when you talk to your friends, other college students, neighbors, tell them it is not real difficult. tell them all they need to know about the election coming up is not all that hard. because all that you ever needed to know about this election coming up you learned in high school drivers education. you learned and high school drivers education. all you need to know about the

election coming up. what did you learn? he learned if you want to go backward, you put it in tr. [laughter] [applause] all right, if you want to put it in for work, put it in d. for president barack obama. [applause] thank you all very much. >> senator tom harkin from just a short while ago here in mt. vernon, iowa, ahead of president obama that should be getting under way shortly. the day after the second presidential debate, the annual state prize, proceeds a lot of

the presidential activities every four years. the president appearing here in mount vernon later today. he will be in athens, ohio at the university of ohio. mitt romney has to appearances in virginia. one in chesapeake at tidewater community college at 1:15 eastern. we will take you to that live. later today he will be in leesburg, virginia. one more debate left after last night's town hall. the next debate is monday october 22 at october -- in the book raton, fla., up win university. we will have complete live coverage on c-span and c-span radio and c-span.org. if you missed any of last night's debate, all of it is available at our debate cut. we also broken down each of the dozen or so questions and follow-ups that were asked into

individual clips. go to c-span.org/debates to take a look at all of that. live here at mount vernon, iowa, waiting for president obama. ♪ >> it might be a couple of minutes before the rally here in iowa gets under way. while we wait some more reaction from c-span viewers about last night's debate. >> swing state voters only for the next section of the washington journal. we will begin the call with patrick -- we will begin with patrick. good morning. turn down the volume on your tv. tell us what you thought of the debate last night.

we will have to put patrick on hold. turn down your tv would you get on the phone. going to gil in jamestown, ohio. hi, gil. what did you think of the debate last night? caller: i think president obama did a superlative job. he went so to toe with mitt romney. i think president obama just missed one. . when the moderator asked how mitt romney would differentiate himself from president bush, it would have been nice if president obama had pointed out that all or most of all his top advisers are former bush advisers, so if you are being advised by those who buys

president bush and those failed policies, we are only going to have the same thing all over again. i think that iran may did not answer the question about signing bill lee ledbetter -- lilly ledbetter act. he did not answer the question in terms of whether he would sign the bill stating there should be equal pay in that regard. that is my comment. i think president obama did a wonderful job. i am so grateful that he came back with an a game to counter many of many of the things that romney has been reporting. >> last night, according to

twitter, 7.2 million tweets cent during the debate. you can see when the ups and downs -- when the candidates would answer questions, you could see where they go up and down. that is available at twitter.com. you can read that for yourself. from politico this morning, our last calller mentioned this, "binders full of women" spreads. in response to an answer about gender inequality in the work force, mitt romney referred to having received binders full of women from colleagues during his time in the private sector.

that is from politico this morning. from the daily callers, this article that is related. here is that exchange from last

night's debate. >> in what ways do you intend to rectify the inequalities in the workplace, specifically regarding the males making only 72 percent of what the male counterparts earn? >> this is one of the reasons

why one of the first bills are designed with something called the lilly ledbetter bill. this woman had been doing the same job as a man for years, found out she was getting paid less, and the supreme court said she cannot bring a lawsuit because she should have found out about it earlier when she had no way of finding out about it. so we fixed that. that is an example of a kind of advocacy we need because women are increasingly the breadwinners in the family. this is not just a women's issue, this is a family issue, a middle-class issue, and that is why we of to fight for it. >> thank you, and important topic, and one i learned a great deal about, to really when i was serving as governor of my state because i had a chance to pull together my cabinet. all the applicants seem to be men. i went to my staff and said how

come did all these people oare men? i said can we find women that are also qualify? we took a concerted effort to go out and find women who have backgrounds that could be qualified to become members of our cabinet. i went to a number of women's groups and said can you help us find folks? they brought a whole binders full of women. i was proud of the fact that after a down my staff, there was a survey of all 50 states and concluded mine had war -- have more women in senior leadership in any state in america. host: pet -- patrick in manchester, new hampshire. what was your reaction to the debate last night? caller: be honest with you, i do not understand how people do not want to have mitt romney as the president because he has been in

private sector his whole entire life. part of bain capital he took over companies and made them profitable. and i just do not get why anybody would still want 5 trillion in debt and deal with that stuff. host: patrick in manchester. greg in cleveland, ohio. caller: when these guys take office they all take an oath of office saying they are going to dedicate their term to the people, not the party. i am tired of these guys having to say republicans/democrats. i want to hear people. it amazes me that mitt romney

was not good enough for years ago, but now all the 70 is the best thing since sliced bread. if everyone remembers correctly, they talk about medicare and at social security, and i remember ronald reagan took the surplus on social security and used it for other things. i kind of blame ronald rated or the republicans for the lack of funds in the security fund. -- blame ronald reagan or the republicans for the lack of funds in ththe social security fund. it took all of george bush's term to catch bin laden. he does not get any credit for taking care reform policy and terrorism. one thing i remember mitt romney was talking about capital gains. for middle-class people, how often do they have enough money or investments to take