tv Key Capitol Hill Hearings CSPAN December 1, 2014 10:00am-12:01pm EST
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lex campaign 2014 is ending the final campaign with one race to be decided tom at the louisiana senate race currently held by mary landrieu. a runoff race between her and bill cassidy set for december 6 debatefinal televised taking place tonight. an update on that earlier today. le guest: thanks for having me. we are a few days from the election. tonight is the debate, which will be on c-span, online, and on tv. we are heading into the final stretch. -- : mary landrieu" the mary landrieu and bill cassidy in the runoff. you bring up the debate.
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what does each side have to do tonight?bate caller: there have been some little things being promoted. tonight? right now.w things mary landrieu's campaign is focusing on bill cassidy's time as a teacher. he has also been a congressman. how much work he was doing for lsu. bill cassidy refused the allegations, saying he was doing a lot of work. had people in d.c. he was working with. as far as the cassidy side, he has been only agreeing to a limited number of debates. this is literally the only debate between the primary and
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the runoff. for his campaign, it has really keep your head down and get through this. story on the a teaching controversy. askseadline, mary landrieu bill cassidy to bring records. the keystone pipeline has been an issue in the race. especially the votes in the house and senate. what did the votes do for both sides? caller:the keystone pipeline han an issue in the at the end of t, -- iote was a lot more think it played better on tv and in d.c. than it did here. anything, these are going the way it did and mary landrieu not
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getting the votes she needed, that probably hurt a lot more than it helped. getting it to a vote or anything like. , maybe thatssed would have become a campaign issue. that does not seem to be something people are talking about here. it was a couple of days or whatever. everyone was wondering what was going on. pass,t ended and did not i have not heard people talking that much about it. people do not seem to care that much. if bill cassidy wins, it would give republicans 54 seats in the congress. what are the places to watch on saturday when runoff vote start coming in? guest: the new orleans area is
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key. certain parishes have been landrieu hasmary been able to do really well in past elections, even though they are republican strongholds. she's been able to hold her own. it will be interesting to see if those areas decide to go more fully republican. will be watching tonight's debate and on saturday. elizabeth crisp, >> here is a look at some of the political advertisements running in this race.
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like his record is crystal clear, voting to cut taxes for those like himself. >> for this? ,> before the end of the year whatever lawful actions i can take. >> president obama promising this for those who are here illegally. your tax dollars should benefit you. mary landrieu, barack obama 97%. i will stand up to obama. i am bill cassidy and i approved this message. >> every morning i say a prayer for my kids. i just want them to be happy and do their best. bill cassidy is a doctor but is cutl voted in congress to
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$86 million from louisiana schools to pay for a tax break or millionaires like himself. i do not know what kind of doctor would do that to my kids. >> i am very landrieu and approve this message because louisiana children should never pay the price for millionaires tax cut. i am bill cassidy and approve this message. >> at few words from mary landrieu on obamacare. on voting with barack obama 97% of the time. >> i am very happy to see the president defend what i think is an extraordinary record. >> if they don't like it, they can on a left us because i am up for reelection right now. >> a reminder that we will have live coverage of the final debate tonight starting at 8:00 eastern on our companion network, c-span2.
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congress is back today after a break for the thanksgiving holiday. in the house members will take a neutralaling with security -- nuclear and electromagnetic pull security among others. the congressional black caucus will talk about the situation in ferguson, missouri. off the four senators expected to book on on on the mist funding bill to continue focusing that the -- the government. >> i would say the single is people should rethink business. mine tells you perhaps you should not compete at all.
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such a breakthrough that you have no competition at all. >> tonight at 9:00 eastern on the communicators on c-span2. and compton who recently retired as nbc news white house correspondent on her over 40 years covering the white house and the administrations of gerald ford through her barack obama. lex we watched and listened to a andy of second graders and card came in to interrupt the president and was stunned. i wrote it down. the president,ts even in front of second graders. the president said he had to go and then we discovered it was two planes down. two plane crashes in new york.
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out and said the president will come talk to the pool. i said there are live cameras in the cafeteria. he did not want to scare the children but he did go into the cafeteria. he said it is an apparent terror attack and i much -- must return to washington. the door slams and then the pentagon was hit. >> the first -- steve simpson, director of legal studies of the california-based institute recently spoke at a dinner in colorado about corona -- cronyism and corruption in the government. he is argued several cases before the u.s. supreme court including imminent domain, campaign spending and public financing laws. it is about one hour 40 minutes. >> welcome to hungry minds speaker series with steve
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simpson speaking on cronyism, corruption, and government power. steve simpson is director of legal studies at ayn rand institute in irvine, california. a former constitutional the guy -- litigator, steve has litigated in the u.s. supreme court and lower and federal and state courts throughout the nation. steve was the lead lawyer in speech now vs. sec, the case that created super pac's. and he litigated many other campaign-finance and constitutional cases over the years. steve has written on a wide variety of legal and constitutional issues, and writings have appeared in the "wall street journal" the "washington post" "washington times" and many publications over the years. let's welcome steve simpson speaking on cronyism, corruption, and government power. [applause]
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>> ok. first of all, thanks very much, hannah and hungry minds for having me here. i have to say it is a pleasure to be back in colorado. the last time i was here, i was suing the government, so i have very cheerful memories of coming here. [laughter] it is nice to be back. that seems like a good segue into my topic than anything, cronyism and corruption in government power. we have heard a lot about cronyism in the last several years. the political right and a lot of libertarians have been talking about it frankly for years and it has become a big issue with the export-import bank and other issues. we have also heard a lot for many years about government corruption, primarily from the political left, but frankly that's from across the political spectrum.
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so i think most people understand that these two ideas somehow go together. i'm not sure everybody would place the idea of government power in the triumvirate, and that is part of what i put it there, because i think that is really the key issue. but what i want to start, let's -- that is in a sense and essence that's what i want to get at. i want to get at what is the issue here and what should we be concerned about? there is a real problem when people talk about cronyism. it signifies or gets to a real phenomenon with government but i think it's widely misunderstood. it's worth starting with a simple question. we hear about cronyism all the time. we hear about corruption all the time, but what does this idea
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mean? and this is part of what i want to do. i want to explore with this idea means and what its implications are. i will say off the top of the issue that there is a problem here but if you think about it the wrong way it has very dangerous consequences. but in order to get into this issue we should first start with what people think of this issue. what is that people are talking about when they talk about cronyism and corruption? so i want to start by characterizing this issue and kind of giving you an example of what we often hear. it's an election season now and it makes sense to think about this in the context that perhaps something that you have heard and if you haven't heard you probably will hear. so think about this and ask yourself have you heard something like this? so here it is. money and influence are corrupting our democracy. we have a government not by and for the people but by and for the special interests. big business colludes with big government and redistributes money and favors to itself at the expense of everyone else. in short, it's not capitalism that we live under in this country, it's crony capitalism.
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i don't think this is anything new to you guys. if it is you are not paying sufficient attention because this is especially in an election year what we are hearing constantly. the question is, what does this mean? what is it that people are getting at? there is a real issue here. i think there's a real injustice and a view of our economic system and our government that is accurately criticized, but i don't think people are thinking about it in the right way. now that's kind of a caricature of the issue. instead of relying on what i think is the general statement, let's first before we start analyzing this take a look at what the commentary is saying. the right is criticizing this issue a lot and let me give you a sense of what a lot of commentators are saying.
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first i want to really get a sense of what this is all about. this is an author by the name of tim carney. he is with the "washington examiner." he's done a great job attacking the issue of cronyism and special-interest influence. but i would part company with him on how he describes a buddy -- describes it. he wrote a whole book called the big rip off and here's one of the things he has to say about cronyism. the idea he is attacking is the myth according to him that this is big business is opposed to regulation. what he says is the truth is that big business lobbies for and profits from big government policies that rip off consumers, taxpayers and entrepreneurs. moreover, government is happy to comply. i think this is a fairly typical view. here's another one from national review. this is how cronyism works. the company wants a special privilege from the government in exchange for political support
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in future elections. if the company is wealthy enough or backed by powerful enough interest groups the company will get it way and politicians will get another private sector ally. this is a quid pro quo or a trade going on here. a few cronies win at the expense of every one else. that's another common statement. last but not least let's look at what a politician has to say about this. this is i think my favorite of all. wendy davis, a gubernatorial candidate in texas, and she's describing her opponent. here's what she says about him. my opponent is "part of the special interests crony class of insiders who has raised millions of dollars in campaign cash." that one caught me. i asked myself, what the hell is the special-interest crony class of insiders? it's not just an insider and it's not just a crony class of insiders but as the special-interest crony class.
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when i hear that i get this image of the guy that lives in a vault at halliburton and sits on a big pile of money and smoke cigars with dick cheney and they calculate on what's going on in the world. [laughter] the point is not to ridicule the idea of crony capitalism, because there is a serious issue. it is to ask the question what do people mean by this? let's characterize this idea. what are the essential points that people are putting forward in this idea of cronyism. i want to analyze the issue and see what is the real issue or what is it that we ought to be criticizing or not. the main point here is what comes across in this description is that big business and big government writ -- collude to rip off the little guy. that well-connected insiders are able to get benefits from government that are not available to others and that, at the expense of others. ensure, the idea here seems to be that this is a problem of bad
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people corrupting a good system. the evil insiders who are profiting in corrupting our system of government. in case anybody misses the point, let me give you one more example. this one is from the economist magazine, purportedly a magazine that cares about the free market and capitalism. not long ago they ran a cover issue called planet plutocrat, and in case you didn't get the point of that day had on the cover a picture of crocodile, it -- a crocodile, a wolf, and a hippopotamus dressed as businessmen. the obvious issue being animals are impersonating businessmen too much. it's too much, so but the idea here obviously is businessman and insiders are evil and this is a problem of outsiders or well-connected insiders influencing our political system to their benefit at the expense
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of everybody else. now, i take pretty close to the opposite view of that. so the idea is that this is a problem of bad individuals corrupting a good system, i think a far better way to think about it is the real problem here is a bad system, not bad individuals. in other words, the problem here isn't individuals per se. it is the system in which they are operating. the problem is not that bad people are corrupting a good system. it's that our system is fundamentally flawed. if we want to understand this issue, we have to understand that aspect of the issue. in short, this is a problem, cronyism or what people are referring to as cronyism is the
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problem of the misuse of government power. it's not a fundamental problem of individuals trying to influence the system. and i'll explain why i think that. i would go as far as to say under the system of government we have, what people complain about when they complain about cronyism or the phenomenon here is absolutely unavoidable, and until we fix our thinking about government and until we reform government ultimately this problem has to persist. that is what i want to focus on. before i go further i should say a word about the term cronyism. and it's actually four words. i don't like it. i don't like this term. this term suggests that the problem is an issue purely a -- of favoring people. it's purely an issue with influencing the system. there is nothing inherently wrong with cronies. the term cronyism really just means favoring your friends or your colleagues.
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that's not inherently wrong, but the suggestion of this term is the problem is favoritism. now i will however be using the term throughout the talk and i will apologize for that. i don't have a better term to use at least not one that's commonly used. in my focus ultimately it's on the phenomenon. what is it that people are complaining about and what should they be complaining about? not the terms. however, if i had to pick a term, ayn rand referred to poll peddling and the aristocracy of the poll, that people are able to use the power of government for themselves. that happens in a particular system. another one that i really like come from the 19th century french economist and it's a legal plunder and i will explain why think this is an issue. that captures it really well.
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so here's what i want to do in the talk. i want to cover three basic points. first, i want to explain why you -- i think this issue is really important. this is an issue that can even -- easily travel under the radar but i think that the issue of cronyism and how we think about a government that results in our economic system is really important. i guess i would classify the issue as i said as the misuse of government power. but there's more to think about in considering why it is we ought to care about the issue. what i ultimately want to do is convince you to think differently about it and advocate to others and try to convince people what is the real issue here. that's the first thing i want to do. second, i want to explain what i think is wrong with the common thinking. the prevailing view that this is a problem of bad people and not a bad system. there is an absence of packaging -- in essence a packaging of two things that don't go together or ought not go together when to
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separate them. i want to examine something i mentioned a minute ago, which is that if this is a problem of government, under the type of government that we have this problem is unavoidable. there's no way to avoid it. i want to expose that, because the way we think about government is a large part of the problem. so long as we characterize our government in the common way and i will get to the issue. i mean, you can sum it up by saying democracy but there's more to say about this issue. so long as we think about government that way and have that type of government, this problem is unavoidable. so let me start with the issue, why is cronyism a concern? my view is cronyism and what people rightly complain about with the term is a misuse of government power, and that should be of great concern to people. that's not what i really want to focus on. i will go back to that. i want to focus on for a minute
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on how this issue of cronyism or the underlying phenomenon, this issue that some people are accessing government for their benefit at the expense of everyone else, which is a common view. how does that affect our thinking of institutions in this country that are really important? that's something we need to step back and think about. i'm guessing that this actually impacts all of you in this room in ways that you have not considered. that's something i want to bring up because it's a serious issue and we need to correct this. if we want to correct a lot of the flawed thinking about government, about capitalism and about business. let's start with the issue of business. it impacts our view. it impacts our view of our economic system. and our view of government, all in negative ways. now to begin with, i will assume, and i don't think this is a bad assumption. i will assume that most people
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in this room at least do not have an antibusiness you. by antibusiness or pro-business i'm not talking about individual industries or business, i mean in principle. my guess is you have a generally favorable view of business, and that is a good thing. i do, too. i think business is awesome. in principle. to signify the point -- simple by the point. to oversupply at i would think about it like this. the industrial revolution and business and all the wonderful things that business has produced, and individuals in business has essentially made the difference between life and death for most people in this country and most people in the industrialized world. so to perhaps oversimplify a bit, if it weren't for those two things industrialization and business probably we would all be dead.
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or at the very least it make our lives infinitely better. so business is a positive thing. but think about this for a moment. think about your own view of business. in the current context of america is it true to really say to yourself that i have a positive view of business and the pursuit of business? maybe you can abstract away from individual examples and i will give you a couple of examples in minute. but my guess is you are like me, and sometimes, there are a lot of businesses that seem to do the wrong thing. there are a lot of businesses that seem to be using government to benefit themselves at the expense of everybody else. and cronyism really impacts that. in fact that's kind of what i would say one of the fundamental reasons that people who would otherwise be motivated to view business a verbally, and indeed -- favorably, and indeed some people who work in business still have kind of a mixed view. business isn't really good, it's kind of dirty sometimes and this
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issue of cronyism impacts it. let me give you a couple of examples to sort of get you thinking about how you think about business and why this issue affects our thinking. consider the electric car company tesla. leave aside a minute that it is electric cars. i don't when you think about electric cars in the whole phenomena of electric cars. tesla is technologically amazing and everyone in southern california where i'm from, as far as i can tell only people in southern california can afford them, but leave that aside a minute. it is an interesting company. my point is not to make a point about whether electric cars are good. it's to make a point about tesla and the broader phenomenon. tesla is now going to build a battery company in nevada. how do they come to nevada? well, there was a big competition that was held to
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decide what state tesla was going to come. it was not really a formal competition, but in effect it was a kind of competition and guess who was competing? nevada, california, and texas. the competition was for how many goodies can we give to tesla to entice them to come to the state? things like a free road, which is probably the smallest, cut rate electricity for a decade, meaning they will get a better rate than other tax payers, and no taxes for something like 20 years. we can talk about this in the question-and-answer period. i will try to probe the steeper. i'm not making a point about whether or not it's good or bad to exempt people from taxes. i can make that point -- it is good -- but the overall point is this looks like tesla has got an inside line to the nevada legislature. this is an example of the nevada legislature and the other legislatures essentially saying hey come to our state and we will manipulate the rule of law for you. we will manipulate our laws. when i moved to california
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nobody said hey we will exempt you from taxes. [laughter] that's not the way it works. only tesla gets this. there are other really good companies. apple has done this. they set up operations in given states, and it really looked like there was a kind of quid pro quo. a trade going on with the legislature. if you look at the things closely, as a lawyer, some of you respect the rule of law, the phenomenon is pretty sickening. let's make a deal. it's not leave us alone. let's make a deal. we will negotiate. these laws will not apply to you, this one, we will erase this part and have a special apple law or tesla law. that really is the impact on people's thinking about government, even people who are very pro-business. take one more, pfizer. pfizer the drug company. great.
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the innovation in medication today is phenomenal. pfizer are producing amazing drugs. but again, tainted by this issue of i will call it cronyism, but there is a deeper issue. one quick example. i used to work at the institute for justice. you probably heard about the issue of eminent domain abuse. i'm hoping you heard about the kilo case in connecticut where suzette kilo's home was taken through eminent domain and handed over with hundreds of other homes to a developer so he could build a company partly which would be used by pfizer. so in my view that taints pfizer in a sense. if you think about the circumstances of this, we knocked hundreds of homes down and ultimately it is like nine years later, and what we have to show for it? not that we should expect good
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things out of this arrangement, but what we have to show for it is a barren field that isn't being used by anybody because it's stuck in all sorts of fights over it except ironically literally a group -- a group of cats. just a bunch of cats, and they are not even fat-cats. they're just regular cats. living in this. [laughter] where is the justice in that? the point ultimately here is this really pains their view of business and it's hard to sort out who are the good guys and who are the bad guys. even if you have a positive view of business you are tempted to think this is dirty. think about it from the layperson standpoint. i think this is really impacting people's view of business. kind of corollary of that or a follow on to that is more broadly broadly speaking it impacts our view of capitalism and the free market, which again i probably don't have to make this point too much to you. but capitalism is a great thing.
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it's awesome that we have a system of capitalism that leaves us free to produce and the society, the advance society we have today is because of that freedom and the economic system of capitalism. but think about what people argue about capitalism all the time. even people who might be sympathetic to it. let me give you a quote and i think that will round out the point. but i think you have probably heard this sort of thing before. so i'm going to read the quote first and then you guys can think about who this sounds like. this is a politician talking about the economy. "this economy delivered record corporate profits with sacking middle-class wages and anemic jobless recovery that promoted and exacerbated inequality. it has isolated the poor and squeeze the middle class. if ordinary citizens who work
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hard and play by the rules only end up subsidizing and bailing out the alleged insiders who do not, then the land of opportunity really isn't." who does that sound like? any thoughts? like john kerry, obama -- that is what i thought. actually it is senator mike lee of utah, who is very good on this issue of cronyism. my ultimate point here is that this is an attitude, so that this is the attitude coming from a guy who is supposed to stand for the free market and capitalism. think about what the average man on the street thinks. they think capitalism is a rigged game. we see this constantly. inequality just rules capitalism. it is not a system of for the people. not a system where you can get ahead. it is not what you know, it's who you know. that is fundamentally untrue --
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untrue and a slander of capitalism. because of that is really the opposite of capitalism. a large reason why they can get away with this is in my view what is going on with this issue of cronyism that makes capitalism less dirty and unfair. finally i would be remiss if i didn't point out the impacts of our thinking, on our thinking about government. you might think and again i'm guessing i am from the ayn rand institute oppose government and that's not true at all. ayn rand thought government was absolutely essential. i agree with you wholeheartedly
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and in fact what a lot of people on the right and among libertarians would characterize government is a necessary evil. i would not say that at all. government is a necessary good. it's absolutely essential for us to be able to live freely. now that only applies though if government is limited to its proper purpose and i will discuss that as we go. yet the prevailing view of government, largely because of this issue of cronyism and issues wrapped up in it is that government is fundamentally corrupt. we have a corrupt government. it is -- i will leave that characterization aside. it's not a government out to do what it is supposed to do, to protect us. it is a government out to rip us
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off, as the book said. that is a very negative thing. that breeds cynicism about our government that makes it very difficult to argue for proper limited government. it breeds a view that government is inherently corrupt. that's not true, not the proper kind of government. so that's to at least give you a sense of how this issue is used. it affects our view of business, capitalism, and government and that is a negative thing. so we ought to get to the root of this problem in this issue and root out what the problem is and separate the good from the bad. that's what i want to do next. i want to talk about what i think is wrong with the prevailing view of cronyism with an eye toward what i think is right about it. in other words, what should we be criticizing when we criticize cronyism?
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if you are with me and you think there's a real fundamental issue here that we need to talk about, we need to think about how this issue is used and what i would say is the great injustice done in the idea of cronyism. now, if i had to boil my theme in this part down to one essential point it would be this. cronyism is kind of a fuzzy term that packages together two things that don't belong together. one of them is bad and one of them is good. the impact of this is too good and to elevate the bad. the impact of this is to damn the good and elevate the bad. it's sort of sullies the good part. what is the good? actually let me backup at second. this is what if you are interested what i'm getting at here is what ayn rand would have preferred as a package deal. this is an idea for a term or a concept that packages under one conceptual roof two very different things.
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the impact of it all, if you are talking about things i should -- that should be evaluated as good or bad, the impact is always to sully or dirty the good and excuse the bad. in a sense it's like blaming the victim in a crime. claiming that the problem was you were walking through that dark alley. so you deserved to be mugged. people should not walk through dangerous areas. that's crazy. we shouldn't think about it in -- immorality and illegality like that. we have to separate the good from the bad and judge harshly the bad and judge positively the good. the good in this, i would say, is the following. business, production, well that is produced by industrious
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people. it even goes as far as limited government and freedom. that is the good that is packaged into this idea of cronyism. the bad is that, not to put too fine of a point on it, but stealing. using the government to steal from others. but it is also the erosion of the rule of law, the kind of perversion of the rule of law and a perversion of government. all of these things are packaged together in cronyism. and what the effect is is we ignore what is wrong with our government today and we end up blaming the wrong people. so that's what i want to focus on now. now what i want to do is, i want to do this by exploring a little bit more that the idea of -- not the idea of cronyism per se but some related concepts. i'm guessing that you have heard some of these concepts. these are ideas that you either see in public these days as public discourse and oftentimes
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you will will see them and -- in economic discussions of government. so let me through a few of these terms out. what i want to do as i want to examine them and try to understand what are they implying. here are the terms. has anyone heard the term rent seeking? the idea here is that government erects barriers to entry are some sort of a qualification to get into a business and those who are in the business are then able to use their privileged position to extract what's known as monopoly rent. basically just high prices. here's an example. i'm a lawyer, let's take lawyers. i am licensed to practice law in certain states. because of that licensing i can at least this is the argument and i think it is absolutely true because it is very difficult to compete with people like me. we can charge higher prices than -- and we can really get rid of
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competition. that's definitely true on a state-by-state basis. i just moved to california. i can't practice law there but it would be great if i could become a member of the bar to do legal practice on the side or just because it would be interesting. i'm not allowed to do that. here's another one, regulatory capture. have you heard this one before? i hope you have. so regulatory capture is the idea that regulatory agencies whose job is to regulate businesses get "captured" by the businesses. they are turned and used by the businesses for the business's various purpose area supposedly a bad thing. that is the second idea, with the individual using the government in a particular way. two other ideas, special interest influence. everyone knows the idea here. private interests influence government or influence the political process and finally corrupting government or
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corrupting democracy. cronyism is another one that fits into this. think about this. all of these terms you see coming up in the debate. people are doing all of these things and is supposedly bad. they are rent seeking. they are capturing realtor agencies for for special interests influencing our policy or corrupting democracy. think about these terms for a minute. what is the common denominator or maybe another way to put it is what is the uncommon denominator? what is the implication for everyone of these terms? what is missing from this calculus when we think about rent seeking private individual or private interests taking advantage of government laws, whether it's regulatory capture, private businesses capturing the
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regulation, special-interest influences. private business, private interest influencing politics, corrupting democracy. the idea here is that private. interest are corrupting democracy. the commonality is that private interest are somehow corrupting our form of government or taking over parts of our government and using that for their own designs. they should strike us as we are. i will give an example of why think that's true in a minute, but think about what is it that people are complaining about here when they complain about all these phenomena? regulatory capture. if the government has a particular power and you are capturing it for your own design. or rent seeking. think about that. why do we call it rent seeking? what is wrong with rent? is rent a bad thing? i have rented a property before and i think it's an awesome thing. but the implication here is evil landlords who are preying on people. but why would we call it rent? special interest influence. anyone know where this term
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comes from? this has been around since the mid-19th century during the progressive era. this is an era when the government grew almost exponentially, purposefully by the progressives who wanted to expand the size and scope of government. their view was we are doing a wonderful public interest and of course on the side of god or however you want to characterize it and the evil special interests, businessmen who are trying to influence what we do. they are bad outsider, illegitimate. we are good, insiders running the government for a proper purpose. so again this is the idea and any time you hear it is
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typically business interests but it very often is any private interest influencing government. so the idea at the root of all of these is somebody's using government, but what is it that they're actually doing? if you really unpacked as i -- this, what is actually going on, what is the real evil people are focusing on? what does it mean to create a barrier to entry? what is the government doing when it creates a barrier to entry? stripping down to its essence. it is imposing, passing a law that essentially says you are not allowed to undertake this business, and you are. what does that mean? that means the government is using the law to actively prevent people from doing what they would otherwise freely choose to do. boiled down to the essence, this is the application of force and that's really what people are complaining about. the same thing with predatory capture. what do regulatory agencies do? they regulate and restrict business. their purpose is to prevent businesses or private individuals from doing what they would otherwise do in a free market.
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they are imposing force. that is in essence what people are complaining about when they complain about all these issues. why is it that they are blaming the private interest in all of this and not focusing on what it is that government does? think of some hypotheticals for a minute. let's say you pay a mobster to destroy your competitor's business. go burn down his business. would anybody describe that as mobster capture? think about that for a minute. the idea is while the mobsters just exist to be used and the problem is here that you are using the mobster for illicit purpose. my view is the mobster is illicit to begin with, and we need to focus that. think about another example. a mobster comes to you and he says, you are in business. nice business you have there and i'd hate to see anything happen to it. if you pay me a little bit every
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week i will protect you from me destroying your business. the protection racket. would anybody say they paid the guy you are corrupting that mobster? that's horrible. you should not do that. what does this leave out? it leaves out two things. it leaves out the role of the mobster first of all. what is he doing? he's using force and is something i talked about earlier earlier. it's a form of plundering. he is engaging in thuggery and a criminal act and get all of these terms and in fact the entire issued cronyism crosses over that entirely and that points at the individuals who are influencing the mobster. that's the first thing it does. the second thing it does is it elides the distinction between the guy who is defending himself by paying the mobster off because he has to in the guy who is enlisting the support of the mobster to destroy somebody else. it glosses over the distinction. that is a really important distinction. let me make it clear that should make it clear, my point is not government is a mobster in all cases nor is it that the
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businessman or private interests are always good. in fact this is an essential point the way to bring out. in one hypothetical the business is being extorted and he's behaving in what many people, if you you don't have any other recourse what is your choice but to pay the guy off and let me do business. in one case he is innocent. in the other case what's he doing? he's using essentially extortion by means of paying somebody to go destroy another person's business. again, the central issue here is in both cases you cannot have
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this. this can't exist if you don't have mobsters. so the question i think that people need to ask about this issue of cronyism and government's role in it is do we want government that acts like a mobster or do we want government that protects our rights and acts like a proper government? there's a difference between those two things. and cronyism glosses over the whole thing. it doesn't say the evil here is a government using its power which is the power of force against innocent people. it just says anybody who accesses this power, we are not really going to talk about what it is, it's bad influence. or is that to influence it in a wrong way. that is another concern. sometimes it's a good thing to use this power and sometimes it's a bad thing but we don't think about what is the essence of this and what is actually going on in these circumstances? now it's beyond the scope of my talk to go into a full-blown analysis or discussion of the nature and proper purpose of
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government but i want to make reallynts that are important to think about when we think about government and the issue over influence of government and special interest warfare or cronyism. best,rst point is government is not of value neutral enterprise that should for everybody to use depending on whether they get voted into office or whether they control the government. there is a right sort of government, a good sort of government, a beneficial sort of government and evil and a
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destructive sort of government and that distinction really matters. as i said, i think that is ancient is ignored in the context of cronyism. what is being ignored is government proper and the idea is governmentdea value-neutral enterprise and to ever wins the lottery we call elections gets to use it for their purposes. it is if i hold the reins of power i pretty much good to use power however i want and the government power which is the power of force. what we need to do to have a proper government is to subordinate the right. we have to understand that government has a limited proper role. that brings me to the second
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which is the essential principle of individual rights. again i don't want to go into a great amount of detail on this but the essential point is this, government is only acting properly if it's protecting rights rather than destroying rice or destroying individuals ability to be free. what rights get us the freedom to thrive, to pursue our lives, to produce, to pursue happiness and to live. so the purpose of government is to prevent our rights from being violated in the way the government does that is by using force only against those who would violate our rights those who would initiate force. if government goes beyond this in any way and tries to get people not just the pursuit of happiness and the freedom to pursue happiness but actual actual happiness the only thing it can do is in effect plunder other people. that is the essential point and the essential thing we need to understand about cronyism. i referred to it earlier as a form of legalized plunder and i think that's a really apt term. the real evil here has to be and we have to focus on those who would use government the way a mobster does or the way somebody who pays the mobster to achieve our goal. that's a real essential my point -- the broader question and it is a broader question here in a
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free society is there any such thing as corrupting the government or what is the role of bribery laws and had we think about those issues he or? i'm going to set those aside and if people want to ask me about my thoughts about that there's a lot to talk about it would be happy to address it. my fundamental point is that or what is the role of bribery laws and had we think about those issues he or? i'm going to set those aside and if people want to ask me about my thoughts about that there's a lot to talk about it would be happy to address it. my fundamental point is that this is an issue and what we have to do is criticize the improper use of government power not simply the effort to influence government at all. think about it like this. when we think about where we talk about the issue of cronyism
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or what the real evil here is that something like businessmen are trying to get favors. we ignore the fact that sometimes those favors are favors end quote are a guy trying to prevent himself from being destroyed by the very government that is supposed to protect him. sometimes those favors, and "favors" in quotes are a guy or a group of individuals trying to use the government to destroy somebody else. there's a really important distinction between the two and it's entirely up scared in this issue of cronyism. we ignored entirely. what happens? i mentioned the idea earlier of blaming the victim. so let me talk about that just a little bit. if you think about it when we talk about government corruption and cronyism. who is typically --who has the finger pointed at them?
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i have quoted a number of people earlier across the political spectrum and it seems pretty clear to me that the great villain all the time his business and especially big business. the idea is biggest bad and businesses are always out to use government power for their own advantage and at the disadvantage of others. but there is never a proper understanding of the fact that some businesses or private individuals or private interest so to speak, they have no other choice. we can't ignore that. we have to pay attention to the fact that the real evil here is using government in effect to plunder, to steal. well, let's put some more flesh on those bones to redistribute income from one person to another, to put up barriers to business's ability to compete, to regulate and restrict businesses and prevent them from engaging in business in any kind of an economical way.
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let me just give you one quick example. let's go back to drug companies. people complain that drug companies in the medical profession in general, the medical device business captured the fda and is using it to their own benefit against others. here is how i think about that. if i were a drug company and i had to spend billions and billions of dollars trying to get drugs approved, beneficial drugs that people want to buy, and run through the fda's gauntlet i would try to capture it too. i don't blame businesses for trying to do this. now you can say this whole process is unseemly. i wish it didn't exist. i certainly wish it didn't
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exist. i wish that businesses didn't have to spend -- and all sorts of private interest, to want to seem like the only ones affected our business but business is a culprit and held out as the evil bad guy so it's worth focusing on. i don't want to suggest that the process is a good thing or the phenomenon is a good thing. but i really can't blame businesses for doing it. it's difficult even to blame businesses like tesla who are in a sense looking for the best deal from some government because not only does everybody do it but they are operating in a context in which there are so many regulations in such a web of laws that they have to deal with that oftentimes it's impossible to figure out how it started, who is the good guy and he's the bad guy and what is that this is supposed to do? that is what they face. inability to do business without dealing with government. you can blame them for doing it. now you can blame people and you
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ought to blame people whose goal here is to use government to achieve unearned benefits or to destroy their competitors. that's a real evil, but decision. now if we don't make that distinction but think about what the consequences of this are. this is one quick consequence i want to go into that is not otherwise obvious and then i will finish by talking a bit about our conception of government and what leads to or allows for the prevalence of this issue of cronyism and what i would call pressure group. consider for a moment if you consider this issue a matter of bad people rather than a flawed system and that ideas that lead to it what's the logical result of? let me read another quote and i sense of it and i'll talk about
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it. this is the new republic reacting to many on the right criticizing cronyism. here is what they say. they say quote if conservatives want to improve transparency or curb lobbying so the corporations find it harder to manipulate the political system there is a vast network of progressive leaning good government organizations working on that cause already. now, i suckle a little bit. progressive meaning good government organization. i litigated campaign-finance laws for longtime championing free speech and that this guy is talking about her all the organizations who want to clamp down on political speech these days. my broader point is that is what he is saying. he is saying what we need to do if conservatives are against this let's join hands and pass more restrictions on people's ability to influence politics which a couple of examples of this in citizens united case
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that's o we think that corruption. why do we think that that's corrupt. think about the word corruption. what does corruption mean? means did he filement and something.n of how do you have a view of orruption or if you think of a diseased body and corrupted by wouldn't germs you know when something is corrupted if and we didn't have a view of health. think i don't have any
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idea what the good looks like but i know what the corrupt version of that looks like. let me ask you, how can we view we actually t that ave today as corrupt just ecause individuals are giving view businessmen or corporations trying to access through t officials campaign donations as corrupt. want to n i ask the i you think about not as the government conceived of in the declaration of independence but the government we have. like this, so we not ection season do hear some variance of the following. for me and i will tax the for benefitsto pay for the elderly or vote for me
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and i'll tax the elderly and the to pay for benefits for students, let's say, student forgiveness. vote for me and i'll favor labor pass lawsess and i'll that restrict the ability to freely associate with people for labor t's good use or vote for me and i'll favor business over labor. vote for me and i'll favor american companies over foreign companies. i'll favor the farmers over -- i don't know, right? eet, you can play this out. to is u ultimately get this idea that the purpose of handout favors essentially to benefits to other people. how you can consider any one corrupt of this to be without thinking that the entire
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system is corrupt? we point to any individual player in this this game and say, he's corrupt but the entire system is somehow okay? doesn't make any sense. t makes no sense to think only one example of this is corrupt but the rest is perfectly pristine. idea at the root of this view of government that is every election season for politicians to appeal for me so i vote whittle income or destroy one person's business in favor of another. short, it's democracy not in it, popper conception of although the popular conception is a very fuzzy idea. ome people think of it as freedom and others think of it this.like but it is this idea that the
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urpose of government is to do what? serve the word of the people and how does that work? well, every election system we the reigns controls of power and they go out and all the osedly serve various interests in society. in practice, how does this have to work? ultimately mean in practice? to cut to the chase, if you're a or a ssman, let's say union or any of the other about, what is k your natural approach to this going to be? are you going to sit still and say, yeah, okay, i'll be destroyed by the government and if the election goes the wrong way, that's just the way that went. destroyed.s will be my tax -- my hard earned income handed to other people. that i'm nce business in will be completely coopted by just sit ment will i there? of course not. i'll go out and try to influence
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the process. and that makes perfectly good sense. it's pre are size hreu /* that our form of government makes cronyism and this legal plunder or special interests or i should use the term pressure group warfare inevitable. nder a system where we believe the purpose of the government is serve the word of the majority or other terms the public interest. i refer to this before. public interest which that, the inevitable
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a kind of mad is dash, like one hour sale where 90%.s are reduced by people will just -- it's like a riot. you just run to this and you try access government. t's a kind of regulate or be regulated view, tax or be taxed ultimately. be killed or mentality. myrybody becomes a threat to ability to live, thrive, produce happy. how can we say number 1, 1 corrupt but his is not all instances of this are corrupt. point is, democracy corruption.m of of hink about it the will the majority or some nebulous
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view of public interest. our view of into government the kind of cronyism that about.dy is complaining and the real tragedy or injustice is that almost always who precisely the people are complaining loudest about corruption , quote, that are promoting this view of government. support theones who idea that this is a democracy limited constitutional republic in a limited -- under a limited government. limited to one essential thing which is to live, your right hrive and be happy by preventing anybody from acting like the mobster that i talked abolishing the use of force in human affairs, people.to protect the role and purpose of
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government is to protect us from crime and not to engage in plunder.d when it dozen gauge in legalized be surprised n't that people go to view that as the purpose of government that to see government as very much like the mobster in my example, except, you know, nothing personal, it's just business, right? works. just the way it t's okay. so if we want to solve this problem, we have to differentlyne think about government and two limit government. if you take away nothing other than these two points, at least away -- or take away hese two points which is the idea of cronyism mixes together good and bad. tantamount to blaming
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victims and ignoring criminals people who want to use government power to destroy and hat is a massive injustice and perpetuates the problem, the mobster gets to travel under the but the real problem here isn't him being a mobster, it's to influence me, right? so you get the blame for that. problem or irst first issue to take away. second issue is this -- the are that people complaining about is as i said baked right into our concept of government. long as we view government's role as essentially a dividing us which is the practical effect, dividing us into warring or warring interest groups corruption will be the rule or the use of force against person, one person against another and warring interest roups and legal plunder is the only option. theerhaps a better word for term that people refer to or the
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erm that they use, cronyism, i would say instead of crony horrible.m, which is it suggests that capitalism is to this thing. the better term is statism. the system in which the system in which the person is nated to the state. but that's redundant because the is that form of government. statism. it is the view that the state is supreme and individuals are subordinate. if we want to fix this problem, only solution ultimately is et us pursue our lives
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let us be free. thanks. [applause] lear clear >> questions? i think we want to wait for -- this we go. over here. why don't we start ver here. and then we'll move sort across the room and that easier. a lot >> so, i've been thinking of you. e've been talking about this line between what counts as self defense versus companies going on the offense. i was particularly trying to think where can i -- what's the difference? and i think where companies tend to cross lines and individuals too and i'm interested in your is when they start saying, we're just trying to level the playing field. we're just trying to make for others.qual this is something that i've just in the campaign
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finance laws before your talk. colorado has been subject to campaign finance laws is ewing them as a weapon this is crossing a moral for me. this is where you're no longer my ally. you are somebody that i don't -- going out there and violating rights now. i don't want to be part of this. say that is a common immorality. would you say -- >> that's a great way to put it. immorality.o the phenomenon is this -- it's -- so, you pull a gun or you pull a knife and he pulls a it's that mean constant escalation. so if you're going to do this do it either to
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the way way or worse. the fundamental phenomenonbut it's a that i think -- so this is not defending and i think you're right.tely it is -- so two points. ne as a general matter, i hate it when economist say it but "things being equal, when a does it it's immoral no question. but it can get really complicated. it. it is o defend o say think about it from the standpoint of asking for a subsidy. competitor got a subsidy why shouldn't i? competitive a advantage. so why shouldn't i -- sometimes i have to go to the government same thing.the
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do regulations i'm going to to try to control him is also going to harm all my other ompetitors and i'm going to ignore that. >> that's absolutely right. met for best kind of for is it's a war against all. it's like those chain reaction when i was way back have a million mouse trap that's have ping pong balls and you throw one in will and the whole thing blows up. it shows what chemical reaction is like. it's just like that. it goes from single examples of it, say, in the 19th century it ould be with the railroads primarily and today everybody does it. the view is, look, everybody does it. so one of things. either i have to do it and i kind of hoice and it's self defense and broadly speaking self defense. game to to play this get by and/or everybody does it and balls and you throw one in will therefore it must be ows
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neutral. it's a level playing field and we'll level down to the least common denominator which is everybody destroying everybody. the only solution is you have to the system. i would say definitely judge the use laws offensively plunder other people hashly but you have to be a little sensitive to the context. what i would say. ext question right here. >> did you use your arguments as a litigator? >> not really. campaign litigator for a decade at the institute for justice and i argued -- these are the arguments i would make in court. this is an example of freedom of speech. we have the right to influence the government if we limit the pay for our es to
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speech we necessarily limit the speech. hat's the first amendment component. now, in the field of law within field, there is a very kind specific e's a very view of corruption and the view corruption in the legal field is not corrupt unless you give a campaign contribution in from se or -- and you get that an actual -- it's a quid pro quo ultimately. argument was always, look irlook, there is no evidence that the for the candidate is yielding a favor in return. example would be i'll give you senator so and so, a contribution and you pay me law, y voting on a given right? that would be seen as corrupt. but that's never how it actually we would always argue
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that doesn't meet the definition sense upt and that makes in legal terms. i think it's not just a viable but correct. have to draw a distinction between legally and morally corrupt. that's not corrupt. you go to a politician you and ive them money and you expect him to vote on your bill. how is that not corrupt? how is this not corrupt? the common sense view, common ense in quotes, of course it's corrupt. it's -- this is not how politics supposed to work. so part of the reason i'm interested tpwh this issue and view of on our corruption and what the kind of starting point is is there's no said earlier the logical result of this kind of it leads directly to
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restricting our free speech and government.nfluence it just makes sense. if you look at it, the way big e do and you miss the picture, it's people trying to officials overnment and you shouldn't be able to arrest the guyto down the street or let you off a traffic ticket and therefore you to finance thele candidate.f the this is a certain amount of common sense to it and the only oppose is taking the big picture approach that i'm taking issue of government power in the wrong view of government. events.all t's monstrous and insane to to if t people's ability
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we're going to have a government influences everything that we do and controls everything we o, we have to be able to influence that. so if -- the way i look at it is to get rid of free peech and the freedom to influence government and the fundamental attack on the foundation of a free society. practical matter it's also crazy. if government has this much power we have to be able to it. the ultimate point, i couldn't use these arguments in court because strictly relevant but they are very relevant to that we need ple to maintain and preserve freedom that's a much more important petty an worrying about
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corruption. >> what's your opinion on the bailout in 2009? do you think that's corrupt? yes.ell, so, let's think about it in tw ways. t's corrupt from the big picture standpoint, in other words this is not what do.ernment should it's probably like an example of of the car e companies over government, although i'm not positive of that. kind of thing often happens. so i didn't really get into this but what we need to think about is if we're going to talk about government corruption said, we have to first have view of what governmentment should do before we have a view of what it shouldn't do. is being corement ruptd. if the poor proper view of is it exists to protect our rights and do that and auto an bailout is not protecting our
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rights. it's the government saying we we r you as a business and don't want to you go out of business so what will we do? we'll take money from taxpayers give it to you. corrupt.rribly actingsically government government saying you chrysler.pport not in buying the products or support forced to these other people, this business through your tax dollars. that's corrupt. that he really corrupt. that he a corrupt view of government. that turns government from a protector into a destroyer. government -- as i said, the mobster rather than the protector of our rights. an example of what i would call legal plunder. it if you want to talk about though if the question is is
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of influence by the car companies on government i icy, i don't know -- what would say is probably. but not having really looked at sort of one of those things you assume that's what is on because that's the way things work these days. especially if you look at gm now and how it's operating and cozying up to the government constantly, so it's hard not to think about it like that. the i couldn't say especially im i'm nd absolutely sure. i'm just 75% sure. and you can probably figure it out by reading -- there are stories about this kind of thing. you can figure out by redding "wall street journal" and "new york times" bus they report in a particular way just about i'm
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dictatorship? i mean, is that not the natural -- right. that's absolutely that is the natural ultimate result. the sense we get closer all time, but let me make two points. supreme court has done a very good job in recent years of protecting the right to participate in politics in this area. it's the right to free speech components so the right to petition government is another way to look at it. i'm talking to government and i want essentially put my concerns before my representatives so they'll take them seriously and hat's part of the first amendment as well. but broadly speaking, you can hink of it as the right to influence what government does. a free people has the right to government. there are many ways, voting and candidates and speaking out and you can testify and lobby. lobbying is a good example of governmento petition in the modern sense.
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although there is a way in which not ing is bad but that's my ultimate point. we're talking about the aible to of being influence government. not withstanding the fact that the supreme court has done a protecting these rights. s the courts are doing some good work in this area, but here's so, a couple of kind of numb. signs of the one, today's young people do not understand free speech. free speech is viewed on america's campuses today. it's not very good. generation.the next if we want free speech to be preserved we have got to teach is all t free speech about. and it's wrapped up in the idea that any ideas that i don't like disagree with, we want to
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stri restrict them. he an attitude the colleges have a right to do that. but this is an attitude that that i have no interest in thinking and frankly your ideas are an affront to me out. want to blot you that translates into the political realm. and this development tied into the first the really negative reaction to the case.ns united that's like the last time you reaction like that was roe v.wade and that led to a irestorm of opposition and controversy. so citizen united is held out as the devil. came down, that case it as were referring to the 21st century version of the
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case.scott it upheld slavery, right? eople -- mainstream commentators talked about. from reality. but it showed the deep hatred for this idea that we should be entitled to influence what the government does, how kind of rooted that is and i hink the latest manifestation of that i mentioned in the talk earlier or in the questions, the the effort to amend constitution. his was a serious effort in congress just about a month ago ulminated in september in the judiciary committee to amend the first amendment so that congress ould pass, quote, reasonable reasonable restrictions on campaign financing on the amount of money on speech. effectively how much whether you lk and
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get to talk. this was -- now, it was defeated the ly because republicans -- this was no way they had -- i think they needed out er majority to get it of committee. many is issue has come up times in at least two decades and every time it gains a little momentum. and i look down the road and sometimes if i'm depressed and try to maybe -- i don't if this is inspirational but at least it will light a fire underneath everybody's butts, sometimes i think we have one generation left for free speech because the upcoming generation doesn't get it and they oppose it it. so that's phenomenon. if uld be really concerned an amendment like that passed and then it's a matter of time. then it's like you pushed over first domino and they'll follow a particular track and here's an end result and then
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it's very bad. others? sure. >> uhm, what would happen to a business executive that told go to hell if they were requested to come -- that's a great question. is what would happen? give you one example that's kind of actuallylly related -- two examples. i don't know if you heard bout this, but j.p. morgan was fined in the billions of dollars taking over countrywide bank the government countrywide bank is in financial difficulty. it was insane. j.p. morganent asked take over countrywide during the inancial debacle and they took it over and then the government
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turned around and said, you didn't tell us the problems with countrywide which makes no sense. the government wanted j.p. take it over because it problems and then they turned around and said, you didn't things to us. so they fined them in the billions of dollars. of speculation that that was a direct shot at diamond who is the ceo of j.p. morgan. the financial press you read the "wall street journal" they make a good case payback for him not playing ball with the administration. and i hesitate to say this is current em of the administration because there are examples. but the lawsuit against standard and poors for down grading the government's credit. the s a baseless -- what hell is that all about? we did what we're supposed to do suing us? 're what's the legal basis for that?
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example is if you read book, he talks opposed tarp funds. lobbied d tarped and congress and was against it. in essence here's the story. said that's a great bank you have there. us change the capital requirements which might render you insolveant. examples whenhree you talk back against the government. that's a real phenomenon and so many ways the government can destroy your business that it's that politicians don't do more of this. now, all of that -- the business this.rs don't do more of
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all of that said, i would say i think it it would be really would love to i see more businesses stand up and out.ast speak whether they can get away with t going into congress and essentially saying to hell with you guys is a separate question. like to see them do more of it. but i mean they really are making life difficult themselves if they do that. this made me think of the government, the f.c.c. and the redskins. what's your comments regarding that. looks like the f.c.c. will try to use their power toause he has radio stations force them to change their name. what do you think about that? of think that it's wrong them to do that certainly wrong f.c.c. to do it. the should have no power overbroad
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casters at all in my view. but i'd have to think more about that. example of government its improper authority to essentially censor speech it an attack on a particular person? morally y constitutionally from a good sense standpoint i'm not sure that distinction should matter. but if that's an issue and you're asking is that an issue of kind of payback against a person, i would say vehement an issue of disagreement with what the -- -- let's say the media and intellectuals think of the "redskins" and the fact have the lefty line on that issue. hether it's -- it's certainly an example of that of just
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ublic pressure coming to bear on a regulatory agency to regulate somebody because people don't ike the message or like what somebody stands for. whether it's an example of cronyism i don't know. but in all events it's bad. government should not have the power. regardless don't like of what you think of redskins as a mascot and trademark. the broadcasters should not -- the f.c.c. -- i mean there shouldn't be an f.c.c. this way, if you is an f.c.c. whose power the right to grant to enter into, you know, a dollar business and if you -- so i talked about public interests being the kind f standard or the way people view the government. if you read the federal communications act, it says that. the federal government
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to l have the authority grant licenses or licensed quote, if it serves the public interest. what does this mean? idea mean? is for mascot or a trade name a company that offends a lot of people is getting rid of that in the public interest? i don't know. standard here at all. this is arbitrary authority. end up e they'll exercising it in an arbitrary manner. non-arbitrary principaled way to do it. this s an issue that should be settled by people -- either fans continuing to, quote, pay for what the redskins or not.offer it's private and unef itable once you have regulatory especially when you make their power hinging on the interest.
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any others? oh, two. how about in the back. exploration on cronyism wasseni wassen lighting. discussing the topic you pandora's box concerning equal opportunity for nuisance. as you characterized earlier, one guy comes with a knife and with a gun, it seems like an arm's race of influence. outlookhave any positive on their being some sort of agreement to lower that or do you think we'll mutually ve a destructive solution through influence? outlook?have a positive unfortunately my answer is so
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long as we view government the do.we do and we this is -- we don't live -- our constitutional republic or limited government.al that's in fact what the law says or what the constitution is. de facto we are democracy and ruled a country that is by majority. you can see that in the president has a mandate to do wants.ng he how many times have you heard that? obamacare was n being debated? american people want this law. herefore it's automatically legitimate and that's all. debate over, right? so long as that's the view, i this possibly changes. ways that re so many various pressure groups, you and can call them interests, many of
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these groups are just out to others and that's not an actual interest, but in any ways there are so many that these groups have come so making ed in the law process, law enforcement process nd the regulatory process that unmaking that and unwinding that is enormously difficult. this, there are some are ives -- there definitely some positive signs. tech industries, tesla, not in with nevada government but in its effort to locally and to get around state franchise laws that because tesla , doesn't want to sell through theers they want to sell to uber are /* --
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has run into all sorts of taxi ortation and regulations. but notice there seems to be a backlash against that. i don't credit that people are the ing to understand proper term of government and they're seeing the light of day but i see it as people are minute, if this is what regulation means there is something wrong with that, omething bad is happening here and let's pay more attention. that's kind of -- that's a hope.er of that's a slight light on the horizon or whatever. and it's a good development because the first step is people we carending why should about this and if it effects you do in your want to life. the second step is start hinking, why do we have these regulations? they're idiotic. what good do they do? we'll have to see
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this.the future holds on it's a very mixed bag. because on one hand people seem effect haved to the of these regulations. n the other hand, the tech industry as a whole, by and arge, doesn't cover every single one, they just don't get it. most of these guys are than me. on a regulatory big model and this is all about public spirit regulations and regulators trying to protect people and it's all good, so we'll just get together with negotiate just like a business transaction and t's not really anything fundamentally wrong with this. i think they're about to find out what the regulatory process really all about unfortunately. but it's hard to say. it's a promising development. that's what i'll say. promising development. it's people pushing back against any egulatory state and pushing back is good news when
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rarely we get any kind of all.ition at i wish i could give you better news than that. -- one more development is -- i'm sorry, i'll get to you in a second. that people are talking about cronyism as an issue is positive. for my talk, i have a problem with the way they're thinking about it. but the fact that they're even and talking about it as a phenomenon and as an issue is a positive development. need to think about it the right way. cronyism has put the -- on its heels. i don't know if they know how to deal with it. it's hard to defend this. in the rightt goes direction or not is hard to say. like the y contradiction of them trying to while the unions
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statement trying to shut down a haring economy market that would lower emissions. perfect , this is the clash of two cultures. irony is thick. see that the results of any national elections in the orizon might be positive for here?you're talking about >> it's hard to be terribly optimistic about the results of elections, but i'll try to find -- i don't know. again, it's kind of like my previous answer that i don't have to think about what is possible to get in what look at and as a positive development and it to always pare what the absolute ideal would be if only history had turned out better.
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what i'll say is this -- so i've of senator mike lee before, but on this issue he's pretty good and i encourage you all read about what he said about cronyism. he gets a lot of it. he doesn't fully talk about it the right he seems to w but understand this is a problem of government power. a lot of what he says is good promising. other politicians on the ational scene, ted cruz is an example, rand paul, also who hey're pushing back against this monolithic view that government knows all and should to control our entire lives. how positive is a development of that? flawed in their thinking in my view but they're pointing to a lot of problems that need to so i think it's say.best i can it's hard to judge and read the impact es and see what
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politics will have on culture if any. ultimately and this is one that heard before, it's all about the ideas and changing the dominant ideas among the public ultimately s and politicians. but you can't start with what's and hope to fix wrong with this country from the op down from a political standpoint. actually can we have this one irst and then we'll come over here. >> with the renewed interest in the cronyism and trying to what's going on are you aware of any academics developments in the resurgence public choice theory? lot ere's actually quite a on this area. the ere's an economist by and i randall holecome just read an article by his and he's quite good although i think issues with all the
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conomists on this issue but from economy standpoint but his academics have been talking about this for a long time. the ideas that in that i referred to. let me clarify. think about those ideas in the wrong way. ut they're a rare phenomenon that people need to focus on. want them to take a different perspective on it. but economists have been talking for a longphenomenon time. there is a lot in this area good. quite the problem is the intellectuals -- there are two problems. people don't pay attention to it it the way they need to and the reason is in my haven't explained why
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free market economics is everybody's legitimate self interest. it's a deeper issue but the out there.s i think probably -- i mean i'm economist and not up on all the literature but this is something i've been reading in my twentiesas for 25 years probably. so there's definitely a lot of subject.omics on the problem is not the economics to how to frame and how think about the issue so in short it's the moral underpinning in my view. one nk we have the last here. >> doesn't seem a lot of the ssues are really over the incentives that we have in our government. an incentive for a congressman to get elected. capture centive is to more money to run his campaign to get it s he going
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constituents. you look at agencies of government and their purpose is grow. their purpose isn't to solve problems but to grow so they ave a bigger budget so they have more control over more things. so it seems to me and rand it's a bout it, formation of the bureaus and to run things. at any of that? >> so i guess what i would say that's absolutely right. a perverse incentive structure. what happens i guess -- the way i'd think about it is if you principals to begin ith you end up with good incentives that reinforce those good principals f you have bad happens.ls the opposite this is like a gresham's law if you ver heard of it. inflate the currency and verybody stows the real money and the only trade is inflated
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currency. bad principals drive out the ood and part is the incentive structure. it becomes necessary to do this morally by becomes appropriate or seems as appropriate. the deeper philosophical reasons in my view. but, once you start this process -- otion, there's kind of a it's a vicious cycle and itself ando build on that's a troubling -- that's a phenomenon.ing again, to harken back to something i said before it's the war all against all. s soon as somebody gets away with rioting -- you get a war mayhem and that's what happens in politics as well. ultimately the solution has to be to return to first to speak and
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understand what should government do as a path to should not do.t so i'll close with that. thanks. applause] >> congress is back in session today. the house expected to work on a including ones on nuclear security and lectromagnetic pulse protections. la the situationbout missouri.on, and off the floor they're an omnibus work on spending bill. we'll have congress when they at 2:00 p.m. eastern and senate on c-span two. happeningwhat else is this week in congress. >> i understand that house inority leader has said that
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nancy pelosi has said that he's -- the republicans in the house should not count on democratic support in getting a passed measure especially dealing with immigration. >> right. -- but it so-called would somehow in way that's funding ed carve out either for homeland security and immigration programs in avoid lar to try to funding effectively the implementation of the executive action. ow doing that in an appropriation bill is difficult to do because while you can and was some talk of this in a memo from the congressional esearch service that was just circulated by the office of alabamajeff sessions of that it's difficult to do
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perhaps through the normal ways that there are you could cause sort of the funding or restrictions on the program itself. it's just you can't do it normal sort of run of the mill appropriations process and i think that's what to be worked out if anyone in the house side wanted to take that approach. >> you've introduced this new that's up there. his kropl 90 bus, and the omnibus spending measure. let's look at what he's talking what he's tweeting about. he says it should fight this means hrough legislative that enact real changes. saying it shouldn't be inclu included. >> the argument is that that's separate debate for a legislative debate from something that should be tied to this appropriations bill.
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and it is true that it certainly difficult to do it through the regular process. other thing is particularly that there is this if the lity that government were to shut down, to the f there's no deal by 11th of december, that some of this would still be going on it comes to president obama's immigration action fees thatere are user people have when they apply for immigration status that would be this program. so even that gets a little bit really a d and it's difficult question to see how would you actually go about what some of the more persistent lawmakers would like to do. >> a come of last things. the so-called tax expenders tax breaksending the reports late in the week there is a package developing in the next and senate coming
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week and the president reportedly will veto that. what do you know of that? well, the package that was sort of circulating around early week, the week of thanksgiving ahead of the a deem that seemed to be coming together between leader harry y white house was quick to announce they would veto it. it's gone back to the board but that's an item if a deal is reached we probably wou make to the floors of the house needs to because it get done before the end of the year but also it's the kind of easure that when it lingers around for a long time people posed to it asro it goes. writing about
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contentious am bat tkorl heading to the floor. >> i think it's probably true other than this government funding bill and the tax package and possibly a defense authorization bill that most of the schedule will be getting as ted to many nominees as possible before the new ss resets with congress which of course with the republicans come into power becoming the majority that would be a taller order. the democrats are trying to get can. ny done as they >> follow him on twitter and rolecall.com. thanks for the look ahead. >> thank you. >> quick clarification. legislative work expected to get at rway in the house
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4:00 p.m. eastern. but ll gavel in at 2:00 debate is at 4:00. live coverage on c-span and on'll be able to seat senate c-span two at 2:00 p.m. eastern. join us when senators bob casey ad richard burr will join for discussion on public health emergency prepare iedly. lessons topics are learned in light of the ebola outbreak and how national polysy applied at the local level. be on c-span3 and then u.s. national , chair will discuss how intelligence is adapting for changes. security the counsel supports james the head his role as of the community. and is the center for long term salt laalysinalysis. be live at 5:00 p.m.
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eastern and on c-span3. on the communicateers paypal. of >> the overarching >> most business books tell you how people i possibly, the mind tells you you should not compete at all. you should always aim something a company onopoly, though such a great group that has no competition. night on c-span2. >> ann compton oon her 40 years covering the white house.
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