murray from florida, democrats line. good morning. caller: yeah. quite obviously, do presidents always make statements that really most people know are not true like that your medicare is not going to -- or your health program is not going to change, or the latest one was when he said only two or 3,000 jobs are going to be created by this pipeline. obviously, everybody else said it was going to be 30,000 jobs. have other presidents made such blatant statements? guest: presidents operate within a set of parameters. they clearly don't want to willfully mislead or certainly not create their own set of facts. but they also argue within parameters that want to create

the right kind of angle and the right kind of spin. and, i didn't, other presidents throughout history have played exactly the same game. but i would argue at no time in our history do we have a greater obligation or responsibility to fact check. "washington post" glen klessler is the fact checker, giving pinnochios, his nose goes up in response to statements that after research, kessler finds to be exagrations or willful distortions. read the fact checker. it really is an excellent column because what it shows is your point is absolutely right, that presidents do, in fact, play very loosely with the facts. in part, because they have points to make. and in part because some of these issues really are open to

interpretation. but we, as citizens, now have a greater obligation and a greater means, i think, to at least to a certain degree hold them accountable host: one final tweet from the rick who said radio barbs the two 41/7365. lo and behold, he winds up devic devisive guest: the argue culture host: i haven't heard that before. guest: i may have stolen it from someone else. i apologize to whoever coined the word. i think it is a fair concept for understanding just how poliarizd and partisan the nation has begun. i have friends who will only listen to msnbc and others who only listen to fox. i do a lot of middle east analysis. i will go on both networks because it's critically important, i think. and you cannot get your

information from one source. host: we are glad all of you are watching on c-span. holly, our last call from port stockton, republican line with aaron david miller. good morning. caller: good morning, gentlemen. i will try to keep it short and keep my temper under control. i take issue that president obama has done everything he can to guard our borders. texas has an unprotected border. our militia law enforcement and national guard are down there protecting the border. and when he came to texas, he refused to go and see what the situation was, himself. and a lot of people think that we are safe. we are not. they caught six isis soldiers trying to cross at juarez, mexico. there was -- there is an unknown

number of isis soldiers down there. facebook had a picture circulating an isis soldier was seen at a jason's deli in houston. and so, the other issue is that with obama care, there is 20-plus taxes and fees hidden in it. host: holly, i will stop you on that point. guest: we are safer. yes say we were safe. i would be the last person to suggest that somehow, any president has the capacity to hermetically seal the borders against the attacks. look at 9-11 after all. i would argue border security is an issue, a serious issue. it's part of the larger package, if you could actually negotiate one between the r's and the d's for a serious set of reforms on immigration. >> clearly is not going to happen.

i am not entirely persuaded, though, on the isis issue. i urge you to look into the isis factor to see actually whether or not that, in fact, those reports are truly accurate. host: the book, "the end of greatness: why america can't have and doesn't want another great president," by author aaron david miller, thank you very much for being with us guest: steve >> thank you. host: we will go back to the question we asked in the first 415 minutes of our program. that is: are you better off about, about the same, or worse off in 2014 as the president talks about jobs and the economy and his goals for the next year. we want to have you assess where you are this year. lines are open at 202-7418-8000 for those who say you are bet he off. if you are worse off 202-7418-8001. about the same, 202-7418-8002. we will get to your calls in just a moment. but first, we want to check in as we always do on ones is nancy

of c-span radio studios to check on the other sunday morning programs, all of which can be heard on c-span radio. nancy, good morning. >> good morning, steve. topics on today's sunday t.v. talk shows include normalizing american/cuban relations, computer hacking at sony pictures entertainment and north korea' a's involvement. the shooting deaths of two new york city mremz and presidential politics. you can hear rebroadcasts of the programs on c-span radio beginning at noon eastern with nbc's "meet the press." first, an update on the two new york city police officers who were shot and killed last night. then, foreign relations committee member marco rubio of florida who appears on several of todays shows including on abc's "this week" which reairs at 1:00 p.m. east earn followed at 2:00 by "fox news sunday" with mike rogers, talking about north korea and sony entertainment. and then senate ron johnson, a

republican from wisconsin and senator ben cardin, a maryland democrat will be talking about u.s./cuba relations. cnn's "state of the union" at 3:00 p.m. and today, an interview on cuba and north korean hacking and, also, threats. also, arizona republican senator john mccain. at 41:00 eastern, "face the nations" and another appearance by senator prub yes and lindsey gram a south carolina republican, member of the armed services committee and chris van holland, a maryland democrat and a national correspondent for the "atlantic." the sunday network t.v. talk shows are on c-span radio. they are brought to you by a public service by the networks. the reair of the 5 t.v. network talk shoes again at noon eastern. listen on 90.1 fm here in the washington, d.c. area. across the country on xm satellite you channel 120. download our free app for you're

smart phone or go online to c-span.org. >> this month is the tenth anniversary of our sunday prime time program q and a, we are fear touring one q and a from each year highlighting authors answer, film makers and policy thinkers from 2005. ken he can't feinberg's interview on the september 11th victim compensation furch. lonnie bunch on the importance of the african-american experience to u.s. history. from 2007, robert novak on his 50 years of reporting in washington. from 2008, renu kiter and 2009, conservative commentator s.e. cupp, a decade of compelling conversations. december 22nd, through the 26th. on c-span. "washington journal" continues. host: for our remaining 20s minutes or so, we want to ask you whether or not you are

better off, worse off or about the same in 2014. phone lines are open. get to your calls. a quick look at some of the head lines on this sunday morning. first, from the front page of "the new york times", the shooting deaths being called an asisination of two new york city police officers. am burned and killed in brooklyn. the suspect then went on to commit suicide. from ny the "new york times," castro thanks the u.s. in a speech but reaffirms communist rule in cuba. cuba, one of the dominating programs or issues on the sunday morning programs. below the front page below the fold in the washingt"washington new strategy for new jersey activists to get governor chris christie's goat. to look at the temperament. first off is aerial from sunset, louisiana. are you better off or worse off in 2014? caller: i am better off in 2014, and i am going to tell you why. i was put on disability.

i was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and i was able to receive ssa. now, social security just said that they were giving us a 1.7 increase in benefits, including food stamps, and i can remember in louisiana when there there was a another some type of what you want to call it. government shutdown where they had shut food stamps down and we weren't receiving those full benefit amount. host: aerial, to donna from glendale, arizona. you say you are worse off in 2014. why? caller: the economy here is still really bad. they say that there is jobs out here, but it's really very hard to find a decent-paying job. i have to work three jobs now. obamacare is not working in this state. when you are a single person, when you are being told that you have a 6,600 dollar deductible

and your rates are going to be two or $300 a month, how better off is that? i can't afford that. i am going to be fined. what is that? >> communistic rule. host: okay. caller: when you are being told that you have to have insurance, you are being forced to do it and you are being forced to pay a fine if you don't have it? >> not democratic. >> that's communistic. host: donna, thanks for the call. the washington post has a six-point series based upon america's middle class. we spend an hour with jim tankersley. the full interview available at c-span.org. he said there was a prominently theory that say the big problems with the american economy is a lot don't have the talent to compete in today's global marketplace. it's true the country would be better off if more workers had more training, the theory missions a crucial action damaging development of the past

several decades. it misses how much the economy has suffered at the hands of some of the most skilled workers who followed escalating pay on to wall street and a way for more economically and socialable valuable uses of their talents including teaching. kay from texas saying she is worse off in 2014. why? caller: the economy is horrible, and the price of everything -- i realize gas has gone down, but it's not making up for the cost of food, your taxes, your insurance, all of that stuff. host: okay. roger from texas. you are better off why? caller: better off. we discovered the recession from the bush administration. we are much better off than we were there. i am a small business person. i am a lawyer. i can tell by the people's

reaction to the problems that they are better off. our unemployment in this rural county is down to about 5%. it's that way. people are buying cars, they are buying houses. texas is hot. we are a lot better off than we were. bush put us in a hole. and it's been a magnificent job that when the congress worked together and the president did to get us out of that hole and, you know, the first thing you do when you find yourself in a hole is stop digging. we have done that. i think probably the republicans will get elected president next time. and i promise you they will act like a fool. we got the biggest one representing united states, gomer goodbye. host: from tom fridmafridman,

writes vladimir putin the 3 hour and 20 minute news conference. who is playing marbles now? he said russia's decline is not necessarily good for the united states. joining us, portland, oregon. 2014, you are about the same. why? caller: stagflation. households, a house or angimportant is bringing in two to four incomes through jobs just to maintain. nothing has changed. host: francis, you are better off. what's your secret? caller: yes. i believe definitely in the truth. and for a while now, the despairagement as far as race is concern concerned, a lot of things had been hidden, but with this

administration and what's going on now, the race issue is no longer hidden that this krunt tree is not in a better place, but i feel like i am in a better place because i believe in the truth. when the truth is being exposed you are in a better place too make things better and to make changes. now that it is exposed that the race issue is really bad, we can change it to make it better. hard or soft hard or soft congressman john conyers writes about young black males and "new york times" focusing on china. north korea and hacking. the headline is: china is asked to help block the korean hack g

hacking. obama administration, the launched cyber attacks, the first step toward the proportional response is part of a broader campaign issue warning against future hacking. so far, the chinese have not responded. their cooperation would be critical since virtually all of north korea's telecoms run through chinese-operated networks. the story in "the new york times." coming up on newsmakers, congressman price of georgia is the incoming chair of the house budget committee. full interview at 10:00 o'clock eastern time. jessica from goosecreek south carolina. you say you are better off. why? caller: actually, my whole family is better off with the obama kay being handed down, we would be a family without health insurance. i was required to get it. it costs me $100 a week to cover my family through my work. if we hadn't have gotten it, we would have been reviewed this

year. we found out we were pressure nasht at the beginning of the year. we have had lots of complications. if we wouldn't have been required to get this insurance we wouldn't have been, we would have been tens of thousands of dollars in debt in medical bills. the fact we had to get insurance, it actually saved us. host: did you end up having a boy or a girl? caller: we are having a girl in february, but it would have been a lot worse if we would not have been required to have the insurance that we have. host: good luck to you congratulations. guest: l caller: thank you. host: the scene inside the mall of america, as many as 3,000 protesters with their arms up, talking about race relations in america. some chanting, i can't breathe. two or police officers a police officer this past summer.

two were killed yesterday in brooklyn. kim from greenbriar, arkansas, you say you are worse off this year. why? >> i am worse off this year. our healthcare insurance has gone up tremendously. i work for a school district, and some of our employees are having to pay as much as three times the premium costs that they had to keep the same coverage. not only has the cost of the insurance gone up but the cost of our deductible as well as our co-pays, for office visits and for prescriptions has gone up. the cost of goods and services has increased. my mother is retired and lives in alabama. she is experiencing the same thing through her medicare coverage as well as her other insurance that she by supplemental. her costs are going up. it's just been really hard. i think obamacare was intended to help people, but i don't think the number of people that have been helped with it are outweighing the number of people who have been hurt with the

increase in cost. host: thank you. the "new york times" is taking a closer look as those cuban americans coming to the sglujs in '60s, '70s, and the gulf to their homeland narrows. valerie joining us from arizona. good morning. you say you are worse off. why? caller: because i live in a small town, 10 miles northeast of 15 incident you have foe go down there. all of the doctors quit medicare. and medicare has raised their prices, the formu laerz. my co-pays are higher. i have talked to other neighbors and they say the same thing had to them. host: valerie, thank you for the call. inside "time magazine" a focus on hillary clinton, talking

about the economy as a potential bid for 2016 gets underway. news this past week jeb bush is exploring his own presidential bred. we'll cover all of it here on c-span on the road to the white house coverage. tennessee, the next caller, bill, you say you are worse off in 2014. why? caller: yes, our economy here in this area is really worse off. we have had kentucky fried chicken close. we have had long john silver's closed and a sonic close here in the neighboring area. people are losing their jobs. our stores are closing up. i don't know where they get that we are better off. when i go to buy groceries, we are on a fixed income, that tells you something. when we buy groceries, our grocery prices kept going up, up, and up. and our -- just the economy here is drying up but the prices keep going up. our gas prices, they have dropped a little. >> that's helped as far as getting transportation. but as far as, you know, what you need to live on, your household goods and food and

shelter and our light bills going up, they have raised our electrical bills. they have also raised the sewer bills on people and i just don't know when it's going to stop. taxes. our city taxes have gone up. and when is this going to stop? i mean we that live on fixed income can look around and say, you know, they keep raising our taxes. but our -- the little income we have got, we got a social security raise, 1.7. >> that's not very much when you are getting, like, $900 a month and they give you a 1.7 raise. >> don't even cover the cost of the hamburger price that just went off. ham ber is at $41 a pound and a little over in some areas. it's getting hard to buy your food any more. i think we are worse off in this particular area than we are in other areas. also, they took one of my greatest channels off of t.v., i guess you know about that. they took our fox news channel away from us this morning. they are no longer on.

host: have you contacted your cable operator? guest: we are on satellite. host: ther one of the main channels. i would definitely look into that inside the ""new york times" 41 after graningz released from gitmo. it took place friday, saturday morning. >> lives about 132 detainees still at that facility in cuba. the president vowing in an interview with cnn's cantey crowley who will have her final day on the state of the union. edwin is joining us from vernon, texas. you are better off in 2014. why? ca edwin, are you with us? caller: yes, because -- because when obama took office, i didn't have a job. so, i found me a job. and the reason why things is like they is now is because

corporate america is the one that caused this country to go down. host: thanks for the call. robert says main street middle class suffered greatly from the failed g.o.p. policies. no worries, the progressives are coming. really? rockford, illinois. good morning. caller: i think we are better off as far as the racial slur because here in rockford, we had about three killings of blacks and here last week, they give a family a settlement of 1.1 million. but they are still in the process but we made a leeway at least getting some kind of compensation. but we had the refer end jesse jackson here protesting when it happened. and he ain't been back. nothing else has been said about

it. host: okay. caller: thank you and i think the country is better off and our city is getting better in race relations. host: willie, thank you for the call. "time magazine" looking at, at 2015, the year ahead, a nasa experiment that includes two twins, kelly twins, scott kelly spending a year in space while his identical twin will stay on earth. nasa will study both of them. our next call is nancy joining us this morning from michigan city, indiana. caller: good morning. fine and happy holidays. host: merry christmas. caller: i come from a long line of a family business, and i have watched our little town. it's been over certain by big corporate stores, dollar stores, wal-marts, you know, they sell plastic and our little store has

been going down, down, down every year. and i think we need to bring back the sherman act so that we cannot have huge corporate businesses take over little towns host: thank you, nancy. from the ""new york times" best seller list, some of the books you might be reading, this is from hewens, "killing patton," number 2. george w. bush's book, "411" is 3. "yes, please" by any poehler is number 4 caller: good morning. how are you host: jerry. caller: i am just retired. host: jerry, we are having trouble hearing you. i apologize. we will go to monica next in

fredericksburg, pennsylvania. good morning. caller: good morning. mertry christmas. host: to you, too. ca go ahead, monica. caller: we are about the same, i feel, under this administration. we have voted between republican and democratic parties to signing on to the biggest promise how things will change and they will be different. and we never see any changes. it is like i always say about time, we go to vote. select your poison. it's like you just don't have any control over anything coming our way. hear about immigration and think how are we affording that? we are sending all of this money overseas. and i have neighbors that

actually have lost their home unable pay their taxes. there is no help for them. there is nothing available for them. i think to myself, you are born and raised in this country, you have paid your taxes. i called a local representative for assist answer with puppy mils in this state, and, you know, you can't even get anything like that resolved. i think: why are we paying salaries? i think with the new health insurance, why is the politician didn't use the plan first get off their insurance plan. they can try this before it's put out to the american public. host: thanks for the call. one of our viewers saying if the fox channel is dropped from the line-up, it's most likely that the fox station is extorting cable operators for higher retransmission fees. the story is available online at "variety variety.com" as fox news and fox business in a dispute over carriage rights and

fees. read that story online. our last call from tennessee, jamie, good morning. you say you are worse off in 2014. why? caller: the reason is where i live at, everything is raising up. are you dr i draw a little si check. they gave us just a little raise and everything keeps raising up. afrnlt in the little town i am in is so high, they charge so much. the food is going up brother in law we are worse off than we were before. host: we will continue the conversation as we do every morning at 7:00 a.m. eastern time, 41:00 o'clock for those of you on the west coast. on mondays, "washington journal" will focus on the keystone pipeline with elana shore and talk with the author of the invisible front, love and loss

in the era of endless war. dreazen will join us. the managing editor of "foreign policy mag zeeb university. tomorrow morning, a full week. kwaz newsmakers" is next. thanks for joining us. enjoy the rest of your weekend. have a merry christmas.

representative tom price and the incoming chairman of the budget committee in studio with us. economic policy reporter with "the wall street taylor, aand andrew reporter with "the associate co--- with "the "theiated press your co -- associated press." >> you have the opportunity to pass a budget resolution that doesn't have any legislative teeth. then you get to send the president other legislation, particularly a bill. you can nd