rob richie, and then stephen moore on his recent book about president trump, trade, and the economy. ♪ good morning, it is friday, november 23, 2018, black friday for retailers and shoppers. 154 million americans are expected to be shopping at a time of record low unemployment. warnings about what can be around the corner. for this black friday, we're asking for your views of the u.s. economy. how confident are you? give us a call and let us know. the phone lines this morning for those of you that are employed, 202-748-8000. for employers and business owners, 202-748-8001.

if you are unemployed, the number is 202-748-8002. our phone lines for those that are retired is 202-748-8003. you can catch up with us on social media on twitter and facebook. a very good friday morning to you. you can start calling in now to give us your view of the u.s. economy right now. here is a headline from the new york times, u.s. consumers are upbeat and no clouds are forming with the lowest unemployment rate in nearly half a century and wage growth picking up. economists expect shoppers to open up their wallets this holiday season. a survey says more holiday spending than last year and some forecasters expecting stronger growth are in postrecession highs, but those projections predict the latest rounds of stock market declines, which push the s&p 500 index into

negative territory for the year. it is too soon to say if the aop rattled investors, but combination of factors including rising interest rates and a new round of tariffs set to take place in january will begin to slow the economy in 2019. story, but in her column and the washington times, jennifer harper talked about the buoyant mood of americans referring to the trunk -- referring to trump. here is president trump while he was on his way to mar-a-lago. pres. trump: no, i think we are doing great. our unemployment is at a record low. if you look at all the different statistics, i think that tech stocks have had some problems, but that will come back. i would like to see the fed with a lower interest rate because i think the rate is too high. i think we have more of a fed

problem than anything else. we're doing very well was china. they want to make a deal there he badly -- they want to make a deal very badly. put on ify tariffs to they don't put that if they don't make a deal because china has been ripping off our country for many, many, many years. they will not rip us off with me. we made a great deal with canada, mexico -- host: that was the president on wednesday with a different view from earlier this month than mike warner of virginia and a speech before the national action network. he argued that the economy is not working for everyone in america. [video clip] now and america, there is more economic inequality than income equality at a greater level that any time in history. today in america, half of

americans are $400 away of an unexpected bill for going into bankruptcy. and we have in this nation, enormous amounts of economic insecurity. never made a lot of money and worked for the same company 35 years, but with that job came a certain level of security with that job with health care, retirement, and if he were to lose that job, there was unemployment, workmen's compensation and disability. that world doesn't exist today. so, we have income inequality, we have income insecurity, and we also have an enormous disparity in terms of equality of opportunity coming terms of where you live and what you look like in america. host: if you want to watch that entire speech, you can do so at our website at c-span.org. we want to hear from you on this

question about your view of the u.s. economy. the phone lines are different this morning. if you are employed, 202-748-8000. if you are a business owner or employer, 202-748-8001. if you are unemployed, 202-748-8002. in the line for those who are retired, 202-748-8003 -- and the line for those who are retired, 202-748-8003. here is a facebook post from mark who says, there are way too many jobs that are low-paying with no benefits. this cannot sustain the economy in the long run. middle-class or thriving working class is shrinking. problem in is a huge the gop tax cuts are ballooning the deficit. tough times are coming. another one writes, the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. give us a call and let us know your thoughts. that is the question in the

first hour of the "washington journal" on this black friday, what is your view of the u.s. economy? and your level of confidence anthony, thank you for calling in. guest: good morning, c-span. my comment is we are still running off the obama policies, economic policies, and trump's economic policies just have gone into effect. -- his taxs went cuts are going into effect. the tariffs and changes go come next year -- changes will come next year. [indiscernible] offt now, we are running the obama economic policies. turned thebama economy around. host: next caller?

guest: yes, thank you. i think our economy, we are getting ready for a slowdown. i think the supply-side of economics will come home to roost. and that is pretty much what it was. i don't think president trump did anything different than any other republican president. cutsg more corporate tax and more corporate deregulation. the stock market is consistently going down. the tories are hurting a lot of people. and i think the previous caller was correct. we are going into the next year costs- and health-care are going way up for the average american. there are a lot of jobs. most people have at least two of them so they can pay the rent

and put food on the table. that is my -- host: steve, we mentioned earlier there was 164 million people expected to shop over the holiday weekend. from some analysts say americans will spend about $1 trillion this holiday season. that is from one of the forbes analysts. how is your view of the economy shaping your spending this holiday season? guest: um, i am not going to spend that much. i think that $164 million unfortunately is going to be plastic. i think most americans need to look ahead at how much they are going to have to spend on health care and the next year, and how secure their job is. it kind of scares me. $164 million because like i said, not very much is -- not

very much is going to be cash. millionat is $164 including cyber monday. bill in wichita, kansas, the line for those that are employed. go ahead. guest: thank you for it is built in wichita, -- thank you. it is bill in wichita, kansas, happily employed. i see the economy the way that it is growing, it is booming. part of business is good -- our business is good and i am optimistic about the future. i am concerned when i hear all of these people talk about the rising cost of health care. now, i am single and 63 years of age. has changed very little in the last four or five years. i guess i am a little confused

and i need to pay more attention to it. but i am happy with my insurance. and very optimistic about the future. thank you. n, a business owner. kind of business? guest: i am a cpa, so i get to see the effects of the new tax cuts up close and personal. know, i am getting off facebook officially after the george soros revelation. thisognize suddenly that is the tv equivalent of facebook. sasse was on c-span at c-span2 all the time. he was talking about his hometown in nebraska and all of the bills in society -- ills in

society, and completely overlooked the primary cause of mortality. he did not recognize our mortality is suddenly going down from but other countries, it is true. the physical and emotional stress of economic insecurity is probably the prime -- it you know, people determine it is the primary reason why beer and the situation right now. sanders isw, bernie going to be hopefully running, and if he isn't running, it is going to be because he decides that someone who may have a better chance that he can support going into the future, situationbalance this where the grandson of walmart is getting dividends on $21 billion worth of stock every year, and the employees that he is

benefiting from have to go to food pantries and get health care from medicaid. thatmebody doesn't think his $21 billion worth of stock, the dividends are being taxed at 15% to 20%, and one of my employees as well as the people whose taxes i work on, are 30%, 40% when you add in social security, you don't think that is an imbalance, i don't know what kind of scales you are buying. host: you are seeing the impacts of the tax cuts. david writes in, it is a matter of time before the deficit causing state tax cuts drag down the economy and we are doomed for a recession. do you agree with him? guest: -- caller: i have a total remedy

for the tax disparity for the country. the federal tax rate is under 40%. and i were part of the time in florida, where there is no state tax. you can't send your kids to school if the school is not good enough. the maximum tax a 65%. that was not a deduction, but a credit for state taxes up to 10% to 12%, so there would no -- so there would be no incentive for very low tax because any state residence 12%, the would get a complete credit on a tax returns. host: appreciate your business -- appreciate talking about your business. here was bernie sanders' tweet from last week. you mentioned walmart. family ownswalmart more wealth in bottom 43% of

americans. meanwhile, 55% of walmart associates are economically insecure. thoughts on this black friday. alan in new york is retired. good morning. caller: good morning. happy, black friday, as they say. economy ashe heavily-dependent on government -- in the former military spending. it has been that way since the early 1950. we can look at the federal deficit, which is i guess $21 trillion as a way that the economy has been primed over the last 50 or 60 years. host: $21 trillion and counting.

the second to listing of that. go ahead. caller: it is a big problem. we are really overly-dependent on military spending as a way to skim the economy. the only way i see it changing is to naturalize or take a profit out of military spending, and i don't know what will happen with the deficit, but i think the full employment is a result of this massive stimulation of the economy by support of the corporations and military productions. new jersey,in employed, go ahead. caller: hi, how are you doing? host: doing well. caller: i just want to talk about senator cory booker. america, beware. -- hadf all, newark was

elected cory booker and the democrats. i was shopping at a store and this young, black male about 19 or 20 asked me for a nickel. a medical. i just blew him off and said, don't bother me, and then i felt bad about it. but that is cory booker's america. tried to month, he blame minimal standards, like on welfare, and i don't want a president to show me how to live on welfare. that is cory booker. and if america votes for that, well, i am warning you right i know that complements about obama's economy, and some people referred to trump inheriting obama's economy. to a great degree, that is true, however, people look at the

unemployment rate has rising but the economy index, such as unemployment changes may be 12 to 18 months after changes occur in the economy. recoveryay the obama ,tarted under george w. bush and that is all i have to say. in the words of pearl hall the -- in the words of paul harvey, good day. host: you mentioned former president obama before. he talked about the economy that he inherited and what he did during his time in office. here is a bit of what he had to say [video clip] mr. obama: i had to get the broom, the mop, and we had to clean it up. and we got the economy growing again.

covered another 20 million folks with health care. cut the deficit by more than half. make sure the wealthiest paid their fair share of taxes of a cell the time i left office, wages were rising. the uninsured rate had fallen. jobs inomy created more my last 21 months than it has in the 21 months since i left office. [cheers and applause] folks, wheno, when you hear these republicans say, ,ook at how good the economy is where do you think that started? [cheers and applause] host: getting your comments this

morning, your view of the u.s. economy and you can give us a call or send us a tweet, or post on facebook. rebecca says wages are not keeping pace with housing and food and says the economy is strong like pre-obama strong. al is in massachusetts. what do you think? caller: good morning. i own a couple of small service businesses. my clients are paying faster and the economy is much better. but try working for a poor person? i worked for sears back in the 1980's and was getting paid $3.10 an hour. and my boss said, you are doing a great job, let me give you a raise. he gave me a $.10 an hour raise. i am talking 1983/1984, and i took that money and started a couple of small businesses.

the left is afraid of the free meanwhile, the complain about the deficit. 100 years ago, we have the income tax coming in and that was supposed to solve the problem, so the left has been driving this economy most of the last 100 years. trump is allowing the free market to do what it does. market is up over all. the market was at 1500 when ronald reagan came in, and like my father always told me, invest in america, and that is the problem with the left. they do not believe or understand the genius of america. host: the for you go, you mentioned the deficit. $21s up as well as trillion.

does that concern you? listen, most of that is because of social programs. because i have been in business 35 years, i think my little business has given state, local, and federal government a couple of million of dollars in taxes they benefited from. if i was on a social program the last 35 years, i would have received close to $2 million probably in services. so, the best social program is a dropped pot. i was not taking from the government, i was getting to the republican -- i was giving to the government. but we have to eventually get people off government programs, but that does not benefit the left. the left wants to control you

rather than you being independent. i want america to be aware of the government that you want more from. host: for our radio listeners, the largest budget items in the past fiscal year for medicare and medicaid over $1 trillion. social security, $992 billion. defense and war spending, $672 billion. income security, $295 billion. interest on the debt, $331 billion. several pensions, $263 billion. those numbers in real-time numbers from u.s. debt clock. charles in alexandria, virginia, unemployed. good morning. caller: yes, i am unemployed here, but optimistic. unemploymentt the rate is very low in the stock market is climbing, and oil prices are creeping down.

had their a good luck in this economy, and i am optimistic that i will find something very soon. unhappily, i was laid off on september 1. a firm picked me up, and the requirements changed, so they said, i'm sorry, we have to withdraw the offer. then another firm picked me up, and said, i'm sorry, we have to withdraw the offer. so, you have to pick yourself and keep moving forward. there is a lot of work out there for all kind of people and all kinds of skill sets. and to the rivers of what calvin coolidge said, a lot of people are working -- when a lot of people are working, the result is employment. host: good luck. from the business and finance section of "the wall street journal" today, looking at

retailers who have had store closings in the past year, u.s. retailers have announced the closure of 5468 stores this year through november 16. that compares to 6000 7500 closures in the same. out -- 6000 7500 closures in the same time last year. "the wall street journal" with their list of stores that have the most closings in this fiscal year. toys "r" us, which filed for bankruptcy protection, walgreens closed many stores. mattress firm, 388 and so on. floridaired in old town -- old town, florida. caller: anybody out of a job is just plain lazy. there are jobs out there to be had.

unemployed, underemployed, and the working poor, that is the foundation of america. out at the can start top rung of life. you got to start out at the bottom and work yourself of the -- and workers of up the rungs. you have to start out at the bottom to get to the top her the people at walmart start at the bottom and you have to work your way up. you can start at the top and work your way down. you start at the bottom and work your way up, so anybody who is savior not getting paid off -- so anybody who was saying they are not getting paid enough at walmart, they are not doing enough. i used to work there. of course, they are going to hire you low because they can.

if you don't like it, pal, hit the door and go someplace else. there eight to 10 years, you make some good morning -- you make some good money. that is just the way it is. but manhandle you -- but it will manhandle you and abuse you physically, but that is the job. you sweat. [laughter] and that is just how it is. host: bob, what kind of work do you do? what kind of job did you end up at the time he retired, bob? caller: i was at walmart. host: the whole time? caller: the past five years of my life. host: what did you do before that? what did you do before walmart, bob? caller: i drove a cab for 19 years. host: bob, we appreciate the phone call.

, what kind of business --joe, what kind of business? caller: i know it is a little late, happy thanksgiving. number one, the economy is doing well. i'm amazed at the callers who have been on here from what has been said from bernie running for president to obama and his economy, attacking walmart, i cannot believe the people's calls and how stupid they are. the economy is doing very well. first of all, obama was the worst president in the history of the united states, were sent jimmy carter. he did -- worst than jimmy carter. the tax cuts have been great. didn't people look at their checks and what he did for you when your checks came in? but everybody is going to be making millions and millions of dollars, but even $10, $20, $30

more a month included people to help themselves to buy more groceries or put more gas in the archives -- more gas in their cars to go to work. people who work at walmart, that is like a first job, like mcdonald's. you don't pick on the people who built walmart themselves. you go to school, you do other things, maybe you get a second job. when i started out, you had two jobs to make a living. saturdays to on make up for what you didn't during the week. if you think a socialist is going to run this country and thenn, or bernie sanders, this country is going to be destroyed. they cannot win the presidency in their stupid as hell. they want to destroy this country. it is unbelievable the hugo you have had on this morning -- is

unbelievable the people you have had this morning. have a nice day. host: getting your view on the u.s. economy this black friday. we will be talking on the issue of the economy. gallup is an organization that polls the economy. here is their bottom line on the u.s. economy, quoting their most recent reports. the economy has trended up as unemployment is registered a 50 year low. the stock market has reached record highs and the economy has had the longest periods of -- growth has economic not been as fast as it was back in with annual increases in the gross domestic product consistently before 4% compared to 4% or better from 1997 to 2000. the u.s. federal budget had

surpluses rather than deficits and american's members of the great recession's where democrat's concerns about trump policies may be holding the present optimism in check. so, they write to her been two decades since americans have been as positive about the american economy as they are now in the volatility in the stock market so far appears to have done little to shake their conference. bob, texas, retired, what do you think? caller: i can't tell you how optimistic i am by hearing the last four or so callers. they were spot on and telling it like it is. individual responsibility is where it is at. you have bernie sanders telling us or the quote you read us about attacking the waltons or individual people making so much money. everybody knows if you took all of their money, every bit of

their money, not just what their interest is and everything and try to spread it around the economy, it would do anything. bernie sanders and his party just typically try to do identity politics. .e talked about the debt the new york times always reports the left as does the washington post and they attacked the economy. they say the economy is doing so bad. in fact, the economy is doing great. it is warring. .- roaring they say it is due to trade deficits that the slowdown in the economy or apparent slowdown might be a to b did to the attributed to the recent elections with the house now going to the democrats. the economic policies will slowdown. i just wanted to report that i think the guys who were talking about individual responsibility

really had it right. host: you mentioned consumer confidence in the economy since the election heard that new york times article we mentioned -- election. wet new york times article talked about with a surveymonkey survey wrote that every since president trump took offense, there has been a split with republicans feeling better than democrats. the midterm election in which democrats took hold of the house may have begun to narrow the gap . for republicans, there was a clear shift. theg republicans before election 66% said they expected their finances to improve. among those interviewed ask -- afterwards, that fell to 59%. patricia from illinois is employed. what do you do? caller: i'm a professional veteran advocate. my comment is the rich get

richer and the poor get poorer. that thef you think u.s. economy is fine, may i tell you that i gauged the economy by or aell it takes care nation takes care of its own. i would ask all of you people to take a look at the poor people in paradise, california, who are out in the back of a walmart parking lot with no help coming from the government. i would ask all of you people to take a look at the people in puerto rico. i would like all of you people to look at all of people still suffering from the hurricanes. you tell me this is a healthy u.s. economy. how did these people gauge a healthy u.s. economy? i will remind all of the listeners as well that the tax breaks everyone is talking about are being paid for on the backs

people,eople, poor medicaid is being cut back, medicare is being cut back. children are being denied and andived lunches and dinners are going to bed hungry in this nation. the image of a healthy u.s. economy? i would argue otherwise. i would say to all of you people as you sit there in the wake of your bloated thanksgiving -- and forgive me for sounding off like this, i would ask you to remember that there are people who are hungry in this country. there are children who are hungry in this country. there are people who have been denied health care in this country. as for your stock market, can i assure you of this? it is entirely illusionary.

i remind you of 1929. i remind you of 1929. -- patricias tricia m illinois. -- says we need to raise the minimum wage, invest in infrastructure, and ensure a social safety net that will help people get back on their feet. earlier this week white house national director larry cut low was asked about the state of the economy. here is what he had to say. it is funny, if you , which a couple of weeks was all it was, a couple of weeks, we had a phenomenal job's number. .obody expected that as i recall, the wage rate was 3.1% year on year and unemployment was 3.7% those were

shockingly good numbers. i understand the stock market selloff has dampened some of the optimism. at the economy is doing extremely well. i don't want to lose sight of that. i am not here to make predictions about the stock market. you know is what more about it as i do. the economy is doing very well. with lower tax rate on large and small businesses, and i think the big urge for men and women to own and operate their own of the news part face of the trump economy and also the blue-collar game, i think this is going to be the best business investment cycle we will have in 20 years. and i cant had one, going to be totally nonpartisan here. democrats and republicans, since the late 1990's emma think now

1990's, iming -- think now it is resuming with our own incentives. i think it is happening. host: we are getting your view of the u.s. economy. phone lines are a bit different this morning. if you are employed the phone number is (202) 748-8000, if you are an employer or own a business (202) 748-8001, if you're unemployed (202) 748-8002 , and maligned for those of you who are retired (202) 748-8003. john is on the line for those who are retired in new mexico. goat head. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call great i enjoy your show very much. -- call. i enjoy your show very much. host: thank you for watching. aller: i hate to be

negativity person this morning, that i have not seen the recovery here in new mexico. we still have homeless people. last year or two years ago for trump was elected, i drove gave the homeless money. i had a hard time getting employment but i was fortunate enough that my father had money and when he passed away he left me money or i would be food insecure. i was a truck driver and i had a college degree and i was a great salesman, and i cannot find gainful employment. ,here are sales jobs out there like furniture sales which i tried this year, where you work 12 hour days, you may commission, you average out hours and get about five dollars

an hour. i have a couple of friends who worked at walmart, young women with kids, none with a college degree, very well spoken people, well educated to be working at walmart, and both of them were toigrated and worked for five hour shifts where they could never earn more than $300 in a week and they felt like there was no opportunity to go anywhere at walmart. both of the young ladies quit walmart and one went back to college and one got another job at another store. want to remind everybody macy's closed here two years ago in our mall in our cookie. .- in albuquerque sears closed and jcpenney closed. if you go to our mall, there is more square footage empty then there are stores doing business. the trump economy has not affected new mexico.

that is why we are sending democrats to the house of representatives all democrats we elected in the first native .merican ever sent to congress she is a very intelligent lady. i think we need to look at president trump for what we have good and bad. saw he is and what mr. bone running around the world with travel bans all these places and we got a guy who is the richest man in the world running around and he will saw your arms off. you up andll pick pulled your fingers off. when they expose his taxes, and his taxes, and a fully expect a hacker will get

that he was free julian assange. trump has not done that. right now, heels $413 million in back taxes and has not paid a million- he owes $413 in back taxes and had not paid a dollar since his dad died and left him money. host: where do you come up with that money? ivist, andm a hackt others have seen it. all i need to know is let want it done and it will be done. if he does not help doing massage, his taxes will go public. host: that is john in new mexico. you mentioned the jamal khashoggi case. president trump spoke about that yesterday in brief comments he made to reporters after he

called members of the military yesterday. comments.me of his pres. trump: i hate the crime, i hate what is done, i hate the cover-up. the crown prince hates it more than i do, and they have vehemently denied it. the cia puts it both ways. as i said, maybe he did or maybe he didn't but i will say strongly that it is a very important ally. if we go buy a certain standard, we won't be able to have allies with almost any country. >> who should be held accountable? pres. trump: maybe the world should be held accountable because the world is a very vicious place. khashoggi wrote for the "washington post" editorial with the lead editorial. they write, the facts are noble and mostly known and truly

hardheaded resident mindful of u.s. interests would assist on accountability for those who planned and committed the murder. he would understand that the u.s.-saudi relationship is depend onand is not any certain person. he would understand that u.s. influence and prosperity would dwindle if the united states offers no objection to the murder of a peaceful 59-year-old resident from northern virginia who was trying to bring light into a confusing world. the president does not understand any of that and it is up to congress to therefore decide. it can take a stand on american values and interests. if you want to read that is it is the editorial page in the washington post. jerry is retired, go ahead. caller: i have a remark to make about our president. he has lied so many times on

television and lie to the public and still our american people love him. i don't understand how. he has integrated us to every world leader that were our other allies. this man is a disgrace. you should never have been president. he has done nothing but make our country looked down on by all the other countries around. it is a shame we have to have a president of this type to represent us. it is a disgrace and i can't understand why anybody would want to vote for this man. thank you. host: conway missouri, retired. caller: thank you for c-span. what i would like to talk is the waste and abuse. what i would like to see is an independent, completely independent of the government to say, forit on

instance, the medical profession, drugs, waste, fraud, abuse, and that is my point. we are talking about abraham lincoln said we will never be destroyed from without, we will be destroyed from within. the swamp will not be represented by our congress and senate and president because they are all in the swamp. thank you for c-span. host: you may want to listen to this program on monday at 9:00 in our weekly your money segment. we will talk about an audit of the federal government and the attempted audit of the military. that will be monday morning. employed.aryland is your view of the economy. are you confident? youer: my view is this, have a lot of people calling and talking about responsibility.

there is another thing that goes along with responsibility, and that would be obligation. all of us have an obligation to the planet we live on and the people we share this planet with. that is what is lacking in this world. if you do not respect the people you share this planet with, you do not respect the planet you live on and you allow a joke to continue for hundreds of years like the gentleman called before has alluded to and there is no responsibility or obligation to anyone except for all those people who fail to remember one of the greatest presidents warned us about, the military-industrial complex is the only thing that matters in the military is the only thing that matters, you will get what you have right in front of you. it is a shame to see it happen. it is all easily fixed but nobody wants to fix it because

it is all about the money. if it was all about the money, what are we in such financial disarray all of the time and that is because our money is being run by people who only see it from the profit and and not helping the people who they are supposed to be helping. host: don is employed in maryland. what do you do? caller: i work for the school system. the way i look at it, the economy is only good of the people who is reporting that the economy is good. the average american working paycheck to paycheck, how is the economy good for them? you have teachers working two and three jobs just to make it. how is the economy good? most people haven't had a raise for 15 to 20 years. goodnly way the economy is and the only reason the economy

it is just good for the people who are reporting the economy is good. rich folks and big corporations. 146: the estimate is that million americans are expected to shop this holiday and that americans are expected to spend a trillion dollars perhaps over the holidays this year. how is that impacting you? i'm not going out and spending the little money i make. most people shop because they feel they are obligated to shop because it is the holidays. they are going out and spending money they don't have and putting it on credit cards. they don't have the money. if you are working paycheck to paycheck, how do you have all this money to spend during the holidays? reporting, whoever is

that the economy is good, is good for them but not for the average working class person. host: thank you for the call. millionber is 164 americans expected to shop this holiday according to the national we tell federation. tennessee,oga, unemployed. what work are you looking for? caller: thank you for c-span. i'm so glad you are doing this because the calls you are getting in our great. it gives you a reality. it is not about race. it is about us coming together as a people. being unemployed, the situation where i have had a medical condition and i have no insurance, and when you don't have insurance, they say you can do this and do that, you go through this and can't get any

help and you can't afford to get a lawyer. you are in a situation where a stress which can cause other problems, and you still have a medical problem. i can imagine with the elderly people are going through. host: what kind of work do you want to do, and how long have you been unemployed? been unemployed since 2017. what is of work -- i am called a jack of all trades. i am going to keep it 100 with you, sometimes it is who you know and not what you know. , which african-american i don't think i am i am just a person, it is one of those things that they see the color of your skin and some will hire you and someone. host: good luck to you. retired,n louisiana,

is in louisiana, retired. caller: walmart has been praised for all that raises they have given. my wife works there for 15 years. this year alone, she would lose of what shey $3000 made last year because of cutting hours. she has lost anywhere from 10 to 12 hours a paycheck for 26 weeks, which will average out year.$3500 less this they take the hours that they cut her and give it to hiring other part-time, so the new people that have been hired as part to not make enough to live in my wife has been cut $3500, so she is not making enough to

live. .omething needs to be done somebody needs to report on walmart how they are doing the workers. thank you very much. host: thank you for the call. less than 10 minutes and left of our segment of "washington journal." for those who are employed or our business owners, for those who are unemployed and for those who are retired. here are the headlines on this black friday this from the front usa today -- shoppers get set. black friday is here. usa taking up the topic of black friday in their lead editorial and other views section of the paper today. they write, there is no denying that people still love going to stores. actual shopping in actual places remains an important part of the how do you ritual for americans. as commercial as stores may be, they are still places where

human beings interact. people feel housebound or have had enough a family togetherness or can't resist the perception of the bargain, but indoorst black friday because of a revolt against the internet age. another wrote this in the telluride daily planet, according to the outdoor industry association 2018 participated in at least one outer activity in 2017 that means we have slightly more people who participate in thanksgiving weekend sales the -- then who will participate in just one outdoor activity all year long. to enjoyso much less the outdoors than it does to hunt for a bargain at a store. to new york, victor, a business owner. what kind of business? caller: i am a photography

business. it is expanding, and i can attribute to the business climate going on right now. i have a platform and i appreciate it. some calls i am hearing -- it is amazing same one caller saying the spirit -- president is an embarrassment. these are the same that include that the corporate tax reduction to -- self -- for him the same people wonder where hillary got the money from period time. it's when you going to a job in the government that pays something like 200 something thousand dollars. i am curious they choose to believe it is not to help businesses stay in this country instead of going to countries like ireland where it is a 15% corporate tax rate.

that is why the economy is roaring right now. i attribute it to the corporate tax rate being lowered and they are staying here and we investing the money they are making. people that call up and say trump should be ashamed of himself, they should be ashamed of themselves as they are sitting home watching nbc news every night in their bubble. i appreciate you giving me this platform. a smallfore you go, as business owner, what did the tax cut mean for you? caller: i can reinvest. i bought a nicer camera. a nice camera but i bought a nicer lens and i have another employee working for me. i can hire another photographer. that allows me to get bigger organizations. i shoot sports and that kind of thing, and it helps me reinvest and actually higher to other employees to work at the photo

shoots. host: thank you for the call. william is in south carolina, unemployed. how long have you been unemployed? caller: how are you doing this morning? host: very well. how long have you been unemployed? caller: about five months. i was working for the food service and they put a freeze on hiring because of the tariffs on china. they had to put a freeze on the model it was making for china. look at the election. the senate had the environment where they picked up six senate seats. they made a net gain of two. good, thenomy is so tax cuts were a scam. i know people whose paychecks may have gone up $60 a week --

six dollars to eight dollars a week. there are at a low wage states like georgia, florida, south carolina. people work 40 hours and still on food stamps. if you look at the election, they should've won georgia it was taken from them. florida was a nailbiter. texas, texas, deep red they only won by 2.5%. don't let people for you when you hear local unemployment hearing people are taking two and three part-time jobs. and hist like trump people think it is. it is still tough out there. if you look at some of the neighborhoods. host: how confident are you that you will find a job soon? caller: i am confident.

it will be a low-wage job. this is south carolina. the wages are very poor wages, even in the manufacturing sector. if you make $10 or $11 an hour, after you pay health care which is through the roof come after you pay taxes, you may be left -- homenging him $250 $250 or $300 a week. if you have children in school and bills and rent or mortgage, gas prices are high, even though they are going down, what do you have? view thank you for the from greenwood, south carolina. more discussion later in the program about the state of the economy. up next we will be joined by rob richie to discuss election reform and the attentional of

ranked voting catching on nationwide. emma slater, stephen moore of the heritage foundation will be here to talk about what he calls trumpeconomics. >> saturday, for journalists talk about the campaign trail. andou work really hard there is always a story to tell. this is political theater here peopleays try to list so can maybe try to understand what they are like and what they are about. 8:00ook tv saturday at eastern, a photographer talks about photos she has taken in the middle east.

>> there was a call to arms and we went with them. it was terrifying because as we were hit a troops and airstrikes, there were take grounds and sniper fire, it was relentless. leave the journalists on the front lines, so we had to run away after them. on american history tv, c-span3, saturday at 8:00 p.m. eastern, how the pilgrims have become a part of america's founding story. is becausehe reason they could be used to give identity and a noble cause, so that the pilgrims came for freedom or god, and because it can for those reasons, that is what america has stood for ever since. >> deceased the -- this weekend of the c-span networks.

the do congress starts in january, there will be than 100 new members. the democrats will control the house. the republicans, the senate. new congress, new leaders. watch the process unfold on c-span. "washington journal" continues. host: election reform is our topic for the next 45 minutes. rob richie serves as president and ceo of fairvote. remind what fairvote's mission is. guest: we have been around since 1992, and we are a nonpartisan electorate of reforms that gives voters greater more choice and -- more choice in a representative democracy for all americans. what that means is -- what that means is working with local and sometimes national conversations

making the democracies work for all of us. host: how are you funded? guest: two thirds from foundations and one thirds from individuals. we are probably nonpartisan. host: you have been around for a long time in a champion of ranked choice voting. how does that work? guest: ranked choice voting is based on the simple idea that if you don't get your first choice, do should have a second choice. if you going to an ice cream store and want to have strawberry and they don't have strawberry, you can be served chocolate and still walk out with an ice cream con. in a political context, it comes in when you have more than two choices. two choices and can only vote for one of them, one will get the majority. if you have more than two choices, the one who has the

most votes may not actually win. should you vote for the one you want is that person cannot win? ranked choice jodey -- rent choice -- link choice voting is -- voting is to give you more options. if you have a majority winner, then you are done. guest: what problems with the current voting system would ranked choice voting solve? guest: the one that people can think about in a political way is the role of third parties and independents. john anderson was a key leader

of our group. whenever you have an independent or third party inject their action, that choice for voters, you have this conversation of what does that mean? it is a win-win solution for both sides. the third-party candidate can run freely and put their ideas out there and engage. if they end up being the majority candidate, they went to -- they win. what about the mechanics of voting. ranked choice voting will be used in the runoff in mississippi next week. explain how it is being incorporated there and what it

does for that election. guest: there was a high profile of my choice voting in maine -- profile of ranked choice voting in maine. they cast voting ballots that is with a first,yle second, and third choice row. and then you will fill the bubble for your first and second choices. that is what these voters have done in mississippi. it is a relatively straightforward option in mississippi. there were major candidates in the first round for the special election. what they will do on runoff day in mississippi, the in-person

voters will cast their votes, but the overseas voters have rnkanked their-- voters. host: we are talking about election reform with rob richie. phone lines if you are a democrat is 202-748-8000. republican 202-748-8001. independents 202-748-8002. you can start calling now. explained what happened in the high profile election in maine. it was used for all of the men elections. in the general election, it was used for the federal races, so the u.s. senate and the two

congressional races. in three of the races, the top two leading contenders was 10%. among thenificant highest in the country. district,gressional they did not need to go beyond that. an incumbent who was in a tight was 46-46. independentwo candidates that had 8% combined. the ranked choice system kicked in. of those who did make a choice. more than two thirds ranked

goldman, and the choice they took to the independent voters, i think goldman ultimately did a better job appealing to them and he is the majority winner. host: there is a lawsuit as a result. that has ranked choice voting been discussed in court? guest: it has been brought up before federal judges before. the basic contention of the lawsuit, and a throughout a lot of claims, which a judge has indicated what he thinks, of what he would like to do because part of the lawsuit is trying to stop the count, and let's not look at the second and third choices. the judge did not go along with that and congress had a lot of really good things to say. he is a trump-appointee.

the key claim is, is a voter getting more than one vote? if you ask for the strawberry cone and ended up with a vanilla cone, did you get two ice cream cones? no, because they did not have strawberry. everyone gets one vote in each round of counting. it is an instant runoff. we are confident it will be upheld. host: how much are other states watching with this lawsuit when it comes to possibly ending ranked choice voting into states? guest: one of the things i get to do is to see this rising movement and interest to people, are many who want to make a difference, and people are really finding a foothold in a number of states.

things movingt of and a lot of states. cities have moved towards ranked choice voting. but a number of state and legislative bills -- and yes,, you always want to kick the tires a bit, and now we are seeing more tire-kicking going on, and there was a partisan consequence to the election this year. the one in maine. functionally, what it did is what it was supposed to do. people who voted in this race, and turnout was really high in maine and high across the country. interestingly, opposite the governor's race was a drier turnout, but the u.s. senate had a winner through ranked choice vote.

people embraced this extra option and used the ballot well. of those who voted in the tight congressional race, 99.8%, a little more comcast a valid -- a little more, cast a ballot. host: two you think it made the races -- do you think it made the races in maine less partisan? i think it is most likely of a civilimpact incentive to look for common ground rather than division in a primary. where you are trying to assemble a majority, the distinctions between candidates are not as obvious by their label. but i think -- this is a most congressional -- this is the most expensive congressional

race in the country with a lot of money spent. you had two leading candidates that everyone knew was going to be an instant runoff. where it made a difference is a behavior toward the independents to the third parties. usually, you see a lot of better, don't waste your vote on these people. -- and ite people's may people frustrated by hearing that. downreally gets toned because those voters really count. and i think, when we see elections where it is not clear who was going to be defeated in the first round, i think you start seeing this behavior of looking for common ground. and statistically, what you merrille in these races, like in san francisco, and the winners are really feisty, but at the end of the day, because the key candidates had to appeal to more voters,

by twoner was flanked thursday -- was ranked by two thirds of the voters. host: the phone line for independents, 202-748-8002. democrats 202-748-8000. republicans 202-748-8001. chris from washington, good morning, you are on with rob richie. caller: hello, rob. i have been following you on twitter, and really wanted to pay attention to where your voice goes from this point. i wonder if you could expand on whether government should have a rowley -- should have a role on shaping voting outcomes? can you talk about the russia investigation? guest: i guess what i would say, i am not going to get into the

russia investigation. what i will say is i want the government and us essentially as citizens who are the government at the foundation, established electoral rules and processes that are fair to everyone. that core mission with greater choices, more voices for us, and in a representative democracy that is fair. that truly represents everyone. the government can make choices to make that more possible, and that is what i want to see the government do, but i don't want them to tip the scales. host: is ranked choice voting an instant? runoff are there others in which one is more likely -- is ranked choice voting and instant runoff? are there others in which one is more likely? guest: i wish trying to think of

a metaphor as i was coming in is in my car, i said, a car pretty transformative for what it can do. i feel right choice voting has a similar sense of let's figure out how to have a way to have more than two choices. the presidential nomination contest. there have been 55 names running for the democratic nomination. there could be 20. and only being able to vote for one is a very limiting expression for the voters. we do work on other issues, too. this is the one we are most upfront with. the proposal, to highlight another one is to take the idea of rent choice voting, combining with changes in how we do

districting, how we established the playing field for congressional races, and give voters a chance not only to express their true preferences, but to have a good chance to help elect someone. there is a fair representation act. a mix of people are saying it is the right way to go. something where we want to get to the core problem of gerrymandering. host: we have been talking a lot about maine this morning. , are you in the second district? caller: yes. host: ok. your thoughts of ranked choice voting this time around? caller: i think it is great.

this washat the key to on outreach and education. think dispelling a lot of the superstitious ideas about one vote is really instrumental in making it an important leap forward. weould also like to say that elected a governor who is really committed to making sure that our constitution is amended so that we have ranked choice across-the-board. thing is forortant the first time in a long time, we have the opportunity to have officials who get more than 30% think that and i

will go a long way in making life a little easier politically, and a lot more consensus. thank you rob richie for your ing rancholp to gett splitting -- getting ranked choice voting the visibility it deserves. ofst: it is a mix of groups people, and maine had been at the forefront of the problem. not in particular individuals, but nine of the last 11 elections for governor had been won with less than half the votes. one of the last governor's won with less than 40% -- one of the won with less than 40%. there is a group called the committee for rent choice voting

that ranked choice voting that did great work -- there was a committee called the for ranked choice voting. there needs to be a constitutional change. i would argue that it settled as an issue in the states, so the legislature has a chance to get votersers -- to give the a chance if they want to extend it to governor. you don't see it as much because of a conflict voters feel about the issue. you see the polls that will say 70% of americans will welcome in welcome an will

additional name on the ballot. felt between the major parties, drove them in whereirection, but we see they step outside of that anyway. , right now, they have an independent governor, and he was running for and they wered he all pulling over 20%. at a certain point, a few weeks before the vote, he decided to drop out. they did not think he could when sue -- they did not think he could win. in a system where you cannot express more choice, and incumbent cannot decide -- an incumbent cannot decide to stay on the ballot. voters are hungry for more.

host: the independent line is 202-748-8002. republicans 202-748-8001. caller -- next caller? go ahead, sir. trump as love donald our president, and i think he is doing the best he can. whether heested in thinks the electoral real votes, should we get rid of it? donald trump was elected because of the electoral votes. i want to know what is, it is on that. guest: electoral college. donald trump has been a longtime proponent of the -- vote. one of the things we should realize is you cannot easily

transport the rules, how people run under certain rules into different rules and know what will happen because there would have been different campaigns. the electoral college system, how states construct what to do with it is a state decision. we have this rule and almost every state, not maine or nebraska. whoever gets the most votes gets all the electoral votes. it is a winner take all principal. in-state like -- in states like new york, it is a done deal. where it is states a recognized as going to one side of the other that -- there has not been a general election targeted to those voters and they campaign since 2000.

it is pretty amazing how out of it though states can be. the solution that we have been supportive of is a national popular vote. it is past in a dozen states. this would keep the electoral college, but have states change their rules, so a set of getting their electoral votes to the winner of who wins the race in their state, they would give their votes to the one who wins the public vote. it doesn't kick in until a number of states pass it. it has been a year-by-year enterprise. votes with 172 electoral --

it this year.ssed i think the conversation will keep on going. think it is a right way to go. host: linda, republican, good morning. caller: good morning. i think president trump has done a wonderful job. if the parties worked with him, we would be even much further ahead. he has accomplished a lot in the last two years. also, i have a question on the ranked choice voting. i am against it, but i have a question wondering if you vote for your party, can you put him also in as a second choice voting? host: leather, thank you for the question. start of the the program, you may have caught this. i was using the ice cream analogy. i go in and want strawberry ice

cream. and they say, we don't have any. if i said my second choice is also strawberry ice cream, the store owner would say, we still don't have strawberry ice cream. the answer will stay the same. essentially, it is the same thing. if you ranked someone as your first choice and he is defeated. if he was in third place and you ranked him second, he was still be defeated. you can do it, but it doesn't do anything to help them. keep in mind, you only get one vote. if you have a preference between remaining candidates, you should indicate it. and so, the person with strawberry can say, i want vanilla or chocolate. host: it has been a main morning. go ahead, caller. caller: mr. richie, the previous

asked the same question that i am going to ask. what would happen if you put your first choice let the republican is your first, second, or third choice? caller: the bruise and paul had 24% each. one of theoice was two, my ballot would not count for anybody else because i have my ice cream and i have my first choice. bruce second or third, it is irrelevant. it doesn't do anything for you or him. onehis case, if you ranked of the dependence -- the democrat second rather, it would not count.

had a debate and asked what he indicate a second or third choice for somebody else? he said no. essentially saying, i'm setting myself apart from the people who support the other ones. opponent, his ballot never counted, buddy indicated that he would like to have a connection with other people. host: was that a tactical mistake? when it is time -- guest: when you have to get the support of more people, you need

to look for a connection. in that campaign, you got to get out your voters who are ready to support you. you also are looking for a chance to persuade undecided people to vote your way. in a ranked choice voting setting committee have have to be appealing as a second or third choice. has the political parties pushed back on what you are doing when it comes to rent choice voting? very contextual. we're going into a new cycle soon. i find a common perspective is that they are ready to embrace change. a short-termt of

calculation of, how would this effect the last election? where the most likely coming ground is that both parties have the very strong incentive to get nominees at the primaries for good nominees for them, and are people who can pull the party together and go forward and be strong nominees. about 15 minutes later -- about 15 minutes more with rob richie. good morning. caller: yes. i would like to support your approach to ranked choice voting . i still have a question that maybe you have answered, but bear with me. if the person said, and i would for thehe ranking

candidates available, but if a person said, i only one of the for one person. -- one person period, could they still vote appropriately for 2, 3, 4? guest: yes. in australia, they require , so they want you to indicate a preference between you --between the major candidates. that is not true in america. we don't mandate voting for ranking. -- we don't mandate voting or ranking.

the opportunity that ranked choice voting provides, if you have a remaining preference, you can indicated. alabama is one of the places were overseas voting can use when choice voting in the primaries. host: why did you start the organization? guest: started it in 1972 -- we started it in 1972. i worked on a campaign and folks were frustrated by electoral politics. wishing there was some way to expand choices. host: what kind of campaign? guest: a congressional campaign, and my wife was working on the campaign, and i ended up doing some work on it. but it showed promise. there is something about elections that is really remarkable, and that is the candidates are talking to people. there was this opportunity

to really have a conversation about where the direction should go, and we often get stuck in a limited dialogue where we are not talking about the issues the way we should. n editorial of a governor who dropped out of the race in maine and said, i cannot win. they talked about the difference between the governor's race with ranked choice voting and not. he had some really interesting things to say and was a really productive member of the debates. and that is what we want from people, to have your best foot forward, and to be able to talk about ideas, and have it be a part of our elections than outside in the corner. host: bill in new hampshire, an independent. good morning. caller: my question is, first of

all, everyone is upset about hillary having money. regardless, whether it is the kennedy's or the bush's, or whoever, that doesn't concern me in the least. what sets me is voter suppression. votert upsets me is suppression. aimedays seems like it is at the democratic voters, the independent voters, the african american voters, jewish voters. it is always democrats were being suppressed. it is every election. aret is a democrats who being suppressed. it is every election. why aren't republican voters being suppressed ever? guest: here was one of the

promising things of this election that is important to recognize. there were a number of states voting on electoral reform. that some may say, that as a democratic or progressive thing. redistricting moving to a more -- process. same-day voter registration, which was on the ballot in my state of maryland, and extending photo rights to people in florida -- and extending voting rights to people in florida. almost two thirds voted for the expansion. the american people are actually ready for a level playing field. they are ready for fairness. there could be a perception on both sides making that

secondary. that can do a better job to take on problems in the electoral process, not try to make it just for their side, but make it fair, that will undergo some support -- that will earn some support for doing that. host: next caller? blake, are you with us? caller: i am. i was going to say is maybe they day -- i was put to say, maybe they need to change all of the voting things. people who own property should be the ones who vote. host: why would you think that? caller: that is the way it used to be. people,r thing, is that if you want one candidate, you can vote for one candidate.

that makes it easy to me love you late the vote -- that makes it easy to manipulate the vote on the people. host: i have a different perspective. early on, we had a lot of restrictions on voting in the trajectory of the country is to say if you are an adult citizen, you should be able to participate in democracy. governor's races all the time. both parties can win governor's races. i think we can make this work, and i think we should, and i think, i will say on the ranked choice voting piece, it is an extension of our right to vote

having power because having a greater choices something i think many, many americans hunger for and we can make it a non-partisan solution. host: what is monopoly politics and why are you making predictions for the outcome of election 2020 already? guest: monopoly politics is what we started 20 years ago and it came from the inside that as our -- as voters were getting more and more driven to make their decisions in congressional races by their underlying partisan preferences, that in fact, that was determined -- those determining outcomes over the quality of the candidates. tip o'neill famously said, all politics is local. a little bit of politics is local, but mostly not. it is mostly about what side you are going to vote for. 1997, 18 month

before the election, to project the winners and more than 80% of congressional races. i think we missed one. we said, we are not going to look at the quality of the candidates. we're just going to look at the last two races for that candidate and what the presidential race was for in that district. we honed the methodology a little bit. information from this most recent congressional race, and we can add it to what happened in 2016. that gives us the data to essentially project outcomes in november 2020, so we did that two days after the election using a method. we did miss more races and there was more volatility than usual, but the three cycles going into this, we only missed one race total out of more than 1200.

or yeah, close to that. -- theally, -- but the core issue we are making is most , the precipitation -- the precipitation -- the participation is a rubber stamp. host: where can voters find that? guest: you can go on fairvote.org and there is an interactive spreadsheet. you can play with it, like if it is a republican year. you can see the implications of that in the race by race projections, 50-50 and so on. yeah. interesting and an tool to understand partisanship. but from a reformer's perspective, we want to have elections where participation matters every time. host: time for a few more calls.

pennsylvania, democrat. thank you for waiting. like a yes, it sounds scary proposition to start messing around with the way people vote. more -- rights, i am for it. every time the state do something, a judge will jump in and say, no, you cannot do with that way. but i guess it would be really beneficial to the democratic party in pennsylvania because if the democrats can win pittsburgh and philadelphia, every time, then the top two candidates in pennsylvania to the senate would always be two democrats. back -- i was all for the affordable care act, which everybody must be reminded -- which everybody must be reminded

was passed with zero. that was not on -- that was non-bipartisan. i was for it until i lost my insurance. so, we got to be careful, and especially when your guest mentioned something about redoing the electoral college, that is scary as hell to me. guest: let's zero in on the right choice vote. the caller may be on -- made like it more. what it is, it is coming out of the price of democracy, so it was passed in maine and being debated in utah, one of our chambers passed it to use it for all of their collections. the are looking at re-mapping one of the utah cities. ist it really does fine-tunes what we already have. some people may say, this is going to help democrats.

-- thebertarian party libertarian party is generally seeing has more likely to cut into the boat base. if you look at over the last 20 years of senate races, there are five senators that are democrats. whose seats were at one point -- those seats were at one point won -- libertarian voters may not have gone over the democrats, but there was a majority win. the statewide race is interesting. only one republican won was less

than half the votes. six democrats did. it is not like democrats depend on winning. wayus, it is a non-partisan of getting voters a greater choice. it does not overthrow the republicans like the horse and buggy going to cars. it is just giving us more power as voters. host: if you are interested, it is fairvote.org. rob richie, appreciate your time. up next on the "washington journal," we will be joined by stephen moore on the u.s. economy under president trump. we will be right back. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2017] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> who was martin van buren? good question. a lot of people probably need to ask that question. martin van buren was the eighth president of the united states.

he is often forgotten. his presidency was only four years long. >> sunday on q&a, ted on his biography of president martin van buren. >> he spent a lot of time with aaron burr, hamilton's murderer. and there were rumors persisted throughout the life of martin -- buren, so persistent that planted it in his novel that martin van buren may have been illegitimate son of ehrenberg. we do not know that. our quincy adams wants wrote in his memo that martin van buren looks a lot like ehrenberg. factions to get southerners and northerners in political alliances together. >> sunday night at 8:00 eastern on c-span's "q&a." real americand on

on american history tv, the 1967 special series, the cbs news inquiry, the warren report and can walter cronkite investigating unanswered questions of jfk's a nation. >> sunday, november 24, a scene continues as oswald is courted into the building. and then in full sight of millions of television viewers, a man named jack surges through the crowd in shoots lee oswald dead. on americanlamerica history tv on c-span3. c-span, where history unfolds daily. in 1979, c-span was created as a public service by america's cable television companies, and today, we continue to bring unfiltered coverage of congress,

the white house, the supreme court, and of the policy event in washington, d.c. and around the country. c-span is brought to you by your cable or satellite provider. "washington journal" continues. host: c-span viewers are familiar with stephen moore. stephen moore, what is -- guest: hope you had a great thanksgiving. 2.5 yearshis book ago. larry kudlow who is now the chief economist for donald trump -- host: appeared in your book? guest: right when the campaign was getting going.

there were 15 republicans running for president or something like that, and i think i knew 14 out of the 15, donald trump, we met with him and talked about economics, the four of us, and it was an amazing meeting. after that, he asked us to be his steering economic advisers and he is a hard guy to say no to. he is a very different person in private than in public. i felt them to be charming, very wise and insightful. it was really fun working on that campaign the donald trump and we helped to write the tax plan another regulation policies. basically what trump win it's is nimcssically, what trumpo nots that donald trump is ideological.

donald trump does not see the world in that way he is just a businessman wanting to bring business principles to washington. --thought that americans keep up at the economy could do better and i was attracted to that. that is the essence of trumponimcs. bringing pro-america policies to washington to rebuild the economy. host: what economic principles is trump a number including -- trumponimcs including. cutting taxes and reducing regulation, those are core republican principles. the big one that trump is having, trump ran more as a blue-collar democrat, trade protectionist than free-trade. , i remember meeting

donaldaid, we called him back then, we said we cannot work for free trade in your for protectionism. i never forgot what he did. he got angry with us and said, i believe the importance of iternational trading, but wanted level playing field and make sure these other countries are playing by the rules and not taking advantage of us. so, we kind of agreed to disagree on that issue. trade is a big part of his agenda and we have a major trade fight with china that people asked me, why is it that the market are so ruined by it? in no small part, it is a part of the trade dispute with china. host: are you concerned that is what disrupts the market in the future? guest: sure, it is a risky and dangerous strategy.

this is one area where trump means something about economics. when i started looking at the evidence, there are some things to what trump was saying that we lowered our doubt tariffs quite a bit -- we lowered our tariffs quite a bit, but other countries have not. we have opened up our markets. by the way, i found the biggest cheater on the planet is china. china is not playing by the rules and trump has avery -- and trump has a very solid case about their trade practices and the steel a lot of our intellectual -- and they steal a lot of our intellectual property and copyrights. ande are many apple stores china -- stores in china that china --ctually own by

that are not actually owned by apple. are you less of a free trader and 2018? guest: good question. in a sense, some of my free-market friends are for what they call unilateral free-trade. we should open up our markets to any country that wants to trade with us regardless of their own trading practices. i believe we can do better than that. we should demand that china play by the rules. this is the big issue for the world economy is whether the u.s. or china will be the economic superpower. i want to make sure it is the united states and not china and they should end their abusive trade practices. and trump said the other day, i am using these tariffs as a negotiating tool to get these other countries to reduce their tariffs as well.

host: chop anonymous is our topic -- trump won nymex -- trumponims is our topic. as folks are calling in, you mentioned your involvement in the tax cuts. this was chuck schumer after the election. [video clip] biaspublicans drew up a tax plan. but we democrats were unified in opposition and he made a clear day after day, after day, after day that the republicans is the party that stands for the rich and for the above the special interests. and we were the party on the side of the middle class and those struggling to get there. republicans predicted the tax bill would save their party and lead to an enormous victories in the midterms. turns out they were afraid to

talk about it in the most out of their campaigns, they did not mention it. that is because it was so unpopular. and i believe there is a change. for 30 years, the powerful wealthy few that dictated tax policies on the republican side and cut the taxes of the rich, that is over. i think our message, our focus has put a knife through the heart of that argument. you will not see the republicans doing that anymore. what they did to was explode the result, people selfish,t was dangerous, and are responsible. guest: there is a lot there, isn't there? look, i happen to think the tax thatwas really the trigger really erupted this economy. we now have the strongest

economy we have had in 30 years and the result are phenomenal. we have 7 million more jobs and people to fill them you know all of the statistics. we had the lowest unemployment rate, the lowest black and hispanic unemployment rate, the lowest asian unemployment rate the lowest female unemployment rate. these are amazing numbers. i travel all over the country. everywhere from portland, oregon to portland, maine. everywhere you go, all you see are construction cranes in the sky. you see new factories and warehouses being built. new condominiums, housing, it is a phenomenal economy. i saw the president of the other day, and i was joking with him and said, mr. president, this is working better than we thought it would. trump has only been in office for two years and we have

economy growing 3.5% to 4%, so we feel really good for americans. by the way, i love the report and this idea this was a tax cut for the rich people. foundatione heritage where i work, we did a report on how this is effecting the average family. if you are making between $50,000 and $70,000 a year, you can get $2000 off your taxes. $2000 tax an extra cut, i don't care what nancy pelosi says, that is not crumbs. people real money for for them to pay their tuition, take a vacation. we feel it was a great triumph. one other thing -- every conversation we have a donald trump about this, every time we talk to talk him he always says, i want to make sure this benefits working-class americans. the steelworkers in pennsylvania

and the coal miners in charleston west virginia, and the auto workers in places like michigan, and so far, so good. it is -- it has created jobs and we're seeing wage increases for middle-class americans. host: a lot of phone calls. dave in new york, democrat, go ahead. caller: real quick. i wanted totion is talk about the trade deal. cut, eating cut any government spending -- it did not cut any government spending. it is kind of a wash, i would say, and that in inflation. going back to the trade deal, we

lost all of our industry. finance is the business of debt, right? we are in $22 trillion of debt and our main export is $3asuries, and china buys trillion worth of our treasuries. how would you calculate that into the budget deficit, the trade deficit, excuse me? guest: it is a great point. the point about government spending, i have been supercritical of republicans of these big budgets. i think everybody can agree that they government in washington, d.c. is way too big and we are spending way too much money across the board. are republicans critical that the president, too? guest: sure.

i said that he should have the toad that big -- he should have vetoed the big spending bill and i think he regrets not be telling it. democrats want to spend more money on social programs. i am for a strong, national defense, but i live two miles from the pentagon. the president has called for every agency next year to cut 5% out of their budget and i love that idea. ande is so much waste duplication in this town of washington. on the issue of trade, look, if trump can get this trade deal with china, and really the ball is in asia's court right now. but if he can get china to agree to open up their markets and not

stealing our technology, and he , is the trade war to end think the stock market will explode. it is bringing back the factories to the united states. we already got a good deal with mexico and canada, as you covered here on c-span. we will have a big vote on that and if couple of months and no one knows how that will turnout, but i feel better about the trade situation today than i did six months ago. host: you mentioned pentagon bureaucracy. on monday, there are efforts to audit the department. tune in, and peter is waiting in new york. thank you for waiting, peter. caller: thank you very much, john. stephen, imake -- wanted to address the difference between the republican agenda, the democrat agenda and the president's agenda.

the president and the republicans are on the same page as far as taxes. i what the president is trying to do is limit the flood of cheap labor, even though he does accentuate the crime aspect of having 30,000 people a month coming into the country. that affects working-class people. i understand they want the cheap labor. jobs are being taken even though we are creating jobs. that is going on. i would appreciate it if you

would address that. there's a lot there on that. we didn't talk about immigration. by would say i agree with trump on 80% of things. immigrants-- legal that come in legally and i think there is consensus that it should be a legal and orderly process. immigrants helped build the country. they continue to do so. hard,e immigrants working helping to build the country. i think the democrats on this issue are out to lunch. ont is the democrat position stopping illegal immigration. their position is catch and release. sanctuary cities and sanctuary get rid of the border

patrol in the ice agents. that's a reduce of that ridiculous policy. that's not an orderly process. i mentioned that we have 7 million more jobs, if we are going to keep this economic growth up, i think we need more legal immigrants. if you're going to build the wall, make sure it has big gates so people can come in legally. good morning. thank you for taking my call. the comment of the first caller were already addressed. economist, but i can see it's simple, give everybody what they want and stick it on the credit card.

congressentatives in are republicans. their town hall meetings and they were hammering about the deficit and debt. now you care nothing about that from them. trump was asident businessman. what businessman doesn't recognize the effect of deficit and debt? guest: it's a great point and i get asked that often. larry the first meetings kudlow and i had it, we showed the projections of what should happen to the debt. those are scary numbers. you show them on c-span a lot. our going to go to 150% of gdp. those numbers are so grim is because everybody are

forecasting its own what going to grow 1.9%. badhat happens, we are in shape. we have 80 million baby boomers retiring and collecting benefits. they are not working any longer. do ifrst day you have to you're going to get the debt under control, we've got to get the growth rate up to 3.5%. growth, people , everyoneback to work percentage point gives you $3 trillion more revenue. if you can start to stabilize starts to fall as a percent of gdp.

i think we are on a better course right now. a lot of my liberal friends are complaining about the debt under trump. let's review the facts. when barack obama entered office, the deficit was $10 trillion. barack obama added $10 trillion to the national debt. we inherited a physical mess. we've got to get the growth. if you get more people working, you get more taxes. republicans fumbled the ball on controlling government spending. national debt is at $21 trillion. getting deficits under $1 trillion? guest: the most important thing is making sure the economy is growing faster than the debt.

the debt is basically stabilize. if we keep this high growth rate growth will see more rate. mentioned debt and trump being a businessman, if you are a businessman, debt isn't necessarily a bad thing. you borrow to build the building, to build a business. it matters a lot what you are borrowing a four. we've borrow to finance a tax cut that would help businesses and bring jobs back to the united states. the tax cut has been a success. host: do you think there should be another tax cut? guest: we need to make sure this tax cut stays in place. it do you think it's just a sugar fix in the economy, there

is concern about the economy because the stock market -- no, this is just kicking in. raiseieve the best way to the wages for middle-class was to make american businesses more successful so they could hire more workers. i was walking down the street and a woman grabbed me by the shoulder and said are you the guy i see on tv? i didn't know what she was going to say. just got a $1500 bonus from my employer. the tax cut for middle-class workers has worked very well. host: good morning. about: when you talk equally participating, i don't

understand. not equal.es are nearu can't have anywhere equal participation among the countries themselves. basically the way trump thinks about it is business. business is not what the country is about. government is not business. business is entirely different from what governing is. certainly, governments have to thougherned with helping wealthiest for the not so wealthiest or even people with jobs. now, i feel ast

though the economic is such that we are all going to be an working for hire people because if you are not born with certain privileges, if you are not born with the education, or knowing the right people, how in the world are you going to not be an aunt? guest: let's address the issue. that's absolutely true, government is not a business. why is government so inefficient? thinksrage american about $.25 of every dollar is wasted. government is extremely wasteful. we have a system, look at the condition of our schools and infrastructure.

it's reprehensible how much money we spend and yet the meager results we get. andre here in washington dc our schools spend $20,000 per student. the schools are in deplorable conditions. most americans would like to see more business principles brought to washington so the government does run with the efficiency of a business. we see it every day. host: we've got about five minutes left with stephen moore. we are taking your phone calls. go ahead. caller: hello, good morning. i have three questions and a content. free-trade equals free and fair trade. the war through trade with china , why do we do business with

them? why are we not opening up more markets to eastern europe? level, the cost of fuel and food is the main thing. the federal reserve -- host: we've only got five minutes. we've taken this abusive treatment from china for a long time. they are not playing by the rules. we are finally standing up to beijing. they are moving in the wrong direction in terms of imposing high restrictions. i talk to men and women who run countries and they say it's almost impossible to do business in china. that can't continue. i like what trump said about the trade work, -- he said china

started the trade war 10 years ago. hopefully this will have a happy outcome. notof the things we did talk about is promoting american energy. we have more oil and gas and coal. we should be using it. i think that's crazy. there.s shale and jobs i was in texas where we have the permian basin. we are producing more oil there isn't any place in the world. independenting more through the shale revolution. that's creating a lot of jobs. host: miami, florida. good morning. caller: a quick observation.

this gentleman is talking about the democrats because of the voting. the republicans just want them for cheap labor. people are fleeing and they are looking to live somewhere to get away from the things going on in central america. another quick observation about regulations, a lot of the jobs are going abroad. western capitalism is running the world. guest: china is not really a capitalist country.

we wanted china to keep moving toward freedom. we wanted to see this march toward freedom. it ended seven or eight years ago. think it's the i biggest issue why donald trump won the election. people are tired about washington not doing anything. that's the backbone of what america is about. it has to be legal. what are the democrats doing to restrict illegal immigration? people are sick of it. trump said we are going to secure the border and make sure we know who is coming into this country. if we can expand legal immigration, it's great for america. moore, one of the

co-authors on the book, we always appreciate your time on c-span. up next, we will and where we begin. we're asking for your view of the u.s. economy. in on yourrt calling screen. the numbers are on your screen. the green talked about foreign aid policies and discussed his goal of eliminating the need for foreign aid. >> you spent a lot of time about how the goal should be to eliminate the need for foreign resiliency.raging half, can yound a give an example of where you've made the most progress? >> internally we have made progress in terms of that

vision. totook the opportunity redesign government to embrace that. members in thef agency, about 300 from overseas. metrics ining at countries and realigning some of our bureaus. results, i concrete would point to ethiopia. not long after i got into the office, ethiopia has had four consecutive years of drought and not falling into famine. doneof the work we have helps them withstand the challenges there. things, theto other country of peru.

production and helping them build internal support to provide alternative economics and livelihood for farmers. the government is funding all of them. now they are doing the funding largely and we are helping with more technical assistance. say their capacity has developed. every country is in a different place. in some cases, it's going to be a long time. there are countries like peru and india which are largely self reliant. we are helping to take them to the next level. >> washington journal continues. host: here's where we are on the washington journal. we've got about 45 minutes left.

we will go to the house of relatives -- representatives when that happens. before, we will talk about your view of the economy. blacke this question on friday. 164 million americans will be shopping this holiday weekend. tell us about your confidence in the economy. phone lines are a little bit different. if you are employed, it's (202) 748-8000. if you are a business owner, (202) 784-8001. if you are unemployed (202) 748-8002. you can start calling in on those lines. nebraska -- nancy from nebraska. about: i am worried health care service workers in

terms of our national economy. host: go ahead. caller: it's clear that government is business. ethical work is only possible with ethical employers. i think a lot of service work in the health care industry is shrouded by romanticism and caring for people. what happening isn't very romantic. host: what do you see in nebraska? thatr: i see a population is decimated from sourcing energy. we have a gentleman talking resources, but these companies source energy, they leave countries decimated in rural areas. trying to revitalize the

with the is impossible capitalist system. host: what can we do? caller: we need to reestablish the ethical business owner and stop romanticizing the entrepreneurship. they need to be that is by communities. community members need to participate in local government. we have families who are telling children that government is bad, that they hate government. this is the message the children have. host: david is in texas. good morning. caller: good morning. i wanted to pick up on what steve was saying about the energy issue. small town i live in, the economy is booming.

energy, trumps energy policy has freed us up to where he can go to war with china on economic issues, we can go to war with russia on political issues. we are not beholden to them. times, if iran sneezed, the price of oil went up. if there was an idea saudi arabia wasn't going to cooperate, the price of oil went up $20. if this was the democrats without the possibility of keystone and the energy companies, the price of oil would be $140 per barrel.

of $50 a barrel. the price of gas is $1.94. that's money going into everybody across pocket. -- everybody's pocket. it allows people to use their money for other things. it has given the government the ability to use energy policy as part of its power when negotiating trade deals. we are not just limited to china right now. taking chinaarted on, the general consensus was he's not's. -- nuts. that america has the upper hand.

there is no way they can win this. i will bet you, marcus down. i don't think their economic numbers have been genuine. there's no way to think their growth was 8%. host: you talk about president trump, he talked about the state of the economy before leaving for the thanksgiving holiday. >> i think we're doing great. our unemployment is at a record low. if you look at all of the statistics, the tech stock is having some problems. i think we're going to do really well. i think the interest rate is too high. i think we have much more of a bad problem. china wants to make a deal very badly. they want to make it very badly. i have another $250 billion

worth of tariffs. china has been ripping off our country for many many years. they don't rip us off with me. we made a great deal with canada. host: that was the president from earlier this week. this is a headline from the new york times. it talked about some of the clouds, including the stock market decline, which puts the s&p into negative territory for the year. warningnomists were that a combination of factors could begin to slow down the economy in 2019. our question, what is your view of the u.s. economy. how much confidence do you have.

he said the economy is doing great for rich people. any indicators are a continuation of obama's presidency. david in arizona, he is retired. you're next. caller: good morning. my view on this is in the long modeled ononomy is the cancer model of growth. now, the population centers of the united states are so expensive that middle-class and working class people can't

afford a home. bought. might father we let in one million people legally is immigrants. we pay overs 200,000 acres of farmland each year. we have some of the best farmland in the world. we are putting it under concrete so we can keep the economy running. i think we to shrink our population. look at it 20 or 30 years. path, theinue on this environment is going to be insufferable. there will be pollution and

traffic everywhere. i don't really think that's the american dream. in california on the line for those who are employed. good morning. i would say that what i'm seeing in the economy is for some people it's gotten better. that's the people that of the highest-paid people. with, iople that i work work in health care so i work with people who are doing ok. peoplee middle-class that i see working in health , they are struggling now. the cost of childcare is crazy. like they make a lot

, a lot of them still have college loans they are paying off. people, we arese just surviving. most of us are living paycheck to paycheck. i belong to a union. campaign, one job should be enough. there are millions of people who can't survive working just one job. marvin is up next in indiana. he is on the line for those who are unemployed. i'm not unemployed anymore. what i want to say on the economy, i think it's working great. works here in kentucky. from working 72 hours

a week. where president trump gave us the tax breaks, i think they are giving more to their employees than they were before. i believe it's working. host: what do you do now? caller: i am self-employed. i just do odd jobs. i took a buyout from my job. host: what kind of job was that? caller: i worked at levi strauss and they offer to buy out 10 years ago and i took it. host: as we said, the house is coming in for a brief session today. we invite viewers to stick around after and we will continue this discussion of your view of the united states economy.

this session is expected to just last a couple of minutes this morning.

aside the lincoln set last thursday in november as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our father who dwells in the heavens. we indeed give you thanks, not only on that day but on every day of our lives. president lincoln said we are prone to forget the source from which blessings come. recognizeause and that it is you who have blessed us. maybe never be numbered among the ungrateful. as our hearts are increasingly filled with gratitude and overflowing with love, we mirror your generous and loving heart. all we need to say is a heartfelt and daily thank you. consent,t our own amen. >> i meant.

-- amen, the journal of the last days proceedings is approved. the chair will lead the house in the pledge of allegiance. i invite others in the chamber to join me. >> i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. the chair placed before the house and rolled bill. 2979, the facility of the united states postal service located at 390 west 5th street in san bernardino, california, as the jack brown post office building. 2b ofsuant to section houseresolution 1142, the

stands adjourned until noon on tuesday, november 24, i'm sorry 2018 forember 27 morning our debate at 2 p.m. for legislative business. host: we are back with you on the washington journal until 10 a.m. taking your calls on this black friday. we are asking viewers for your view of the u.s. economy. phone lines are different in this segment. if you are employed, (202)-748- 8000. if you are an employer, (202)-748-8001. if you are unemployed, (202)-748-8002. if you are retired, (202)-748- 8003. here are headlines today. black friday not fading. retailers focused on friday

despite opening earlier and earlier. a buyers market this morning. page of from the front the oakland press, ready set shop. illinois, a business owner. what kind of business? caller: i am a retired business owner. i had a hairstyling shop for 54 years. i want to say that everyone is giving trump all the credit for the upswing in the economy. i have lived long enough to know that every time we had a recession, it takes 10 years to pull out of that and for it to start to lift. at the end of obama's administration, it started lifting. give him some credit. do not give it all to trump. i also want to say, i do not

appreciate having america represented by such a dishonest person, with no integrity or common sense at all. other than that, i would say that illinois is in poor shape. i live outside of your you -- peoria. there are only $10 jobs here. the retired people, because they do not have enough social security to live on, they are vying for those jobs with the young just out of school. young people. that makes it even worse. host: you mentioned president obama. he was on the campaign trail ahead of the 2018 elections. he talked on the campaign trail about the economy that he inherited and what he did during his time in office. [applause] >> i had to get a broom and a

mop. we had to clean it up. [applause] we got the economy growing again. [applause] covered another 20 million folks with health care. cut the deficit by more than half. made sure the wealthiest pay their fair share of taxes so by the time i left office, wages were rising, the uninsured rate economy created more jobs in my last 21 months than it has in the 21 months since i left office. [applause] when you hear these republicans brag about how good the economy

is -- where do you think that started? [applause] host: that was former president obama from a few weeks ago. sherry, as we ask about your view from facebook saying, "thanks president trump for our great economy there could jeff says it is the same as it has been for years. -- our great economy." have leftmericans behind and now we're trashing our environment and each other." give us a call, like charlie did from new york. good morning. caller: how are you doing? becauseomy is a mess corporations have taken over our country. they have taken over the democratic and republican parties. politics, economics follows

politics. if you look back when our economy was doing good, like eisenhower and the early 1960's, , the american people were not saying, let's let the business leaders take it over. they do not know best. the american people know best. we need to create a system where people can profit in a fair economy and that will follow. host: dennis in illinois, retired. what is your view? caller: i am retired. my main concern is when they , peoplehat tax plan would get more money in their paychecks or bonuses or whatever, i get social security -- does this money that everyone supposedly will be getting is, the social security people be

getting raises also? host: how are you getting by in illinois? caller: i do all right because i have pensions and social security. trumpou have a guy like -- before trump was even president, 30 years ago people thought he was an idiot. ago, was an idiot 30 years what is he now? host: that is dennis. this is david in ohio, also retired. caller: yes, i have been retired for five years. my wife and i are both retired. we are doing great. our mutual fund in the last quarter. jump is doing a good job. there is a lot of trump bashers out there. -- trump is doing a good job.

i did not vote for obama but i did not bash him. i waited eight years. now it is republicans turn. as far as the economy, the deficit each year as the government, plus the national debt is a disgrace. , werk for the municipality froze our wages for years. they froze hiring. i do not see why the government cannot do it. freeze the increase in budgets. get this debt and deficit under control. host: how worried are you about the downturn in the stock market of late? made money for the last year. now they're going to take a little away. what are you going to do? i think the economy is good.

i think the flavor is good. my daughter had two jobs in two days, when she applied recently, again. she had turned down one job. i could get a job. i am done working. host: thanks. this is a look at the dow jones industrial average, hovering 24,300 at the beginning of the year, on the first trading day of the year, 24,800. more trading time in this year. concerns about what the downturn has meant in recent weeks. we want to know how it has impacted your view of the u.s. economy overall? san francisco, california on the line for those employed. caller: good morning. to answer your question about the dow. society has a lot to do with why, the downturn.

house becauseor a i want to buy in before rates go much higher. if, becauseo that of what trump has done with our economy. been, thee, he has doors have been slammed in his face all throughout his years and despite that, we are still growing and improving. barb on facebook saying wages have not changed significantly in years. "this economy sucks for most of us. anyone complaining is to argue any construction company, that will hire on the spot." kathleen says she loves the economy.

"my husband's small business is doing the best it has done in years." michelle in kansas city, missouri, for those unemployed. how long have you been unemployed? caller: january 5 of this year. i have a law degree. i cannot get a secretary job paying $12 per hour. i do not know where these jobs are. i have a huge student loan debt. i cannot find a job. am i supposed to be at 49 years old, go back to waiting tables? i do not understand this great economy -- trump has done nothing. i do not understand the optimism. what do i care about the stock market? i don't have retirement? i don't own stocks. i am living paycheck to paycheck

and relive a modest life. i do not understand. let me know. thank you. 164 million americans expected to shop this holiday season. we want to hear how your view on the economy is impacting your shopping plans this holiday season. new mexico, retired, good morning. caller: i love your program. you do some good editorials. i appreciate it. i have not seen a race. i have been -- a raise. i have been retired a few years. i worked at a ranch. our economy is desolate. it is apparent wasteland over here. where is my bonus? trump, send me some money and cut your hair. host: taking your calls.

if you are employed, (202)-748- 8000. business owner, (202)-748-8001. unemployed, (202)-748-8002. if you are retired, (202)-748- 8003. papers.from the looking ahead to congress back in session next week and also, democrats in the house expected to finalize leadership plans. this is from the washington post. in pursuit of the gavel, this rental democrats, momentum is with nancy pelosi. one potential challenger dropped her plans and leaders of the have found themselves under intense scrutiny by nancy pelosi supporters, who accuse them of sexism and disloyalty.

no potential challenger is close to preparing to jump in, according to those involved. washington post. several other papers following the ongoing leadership race. this story from the washington times. the work of the lame-duck congress, house judiciary committee chairman bob goodlatte has issued subpoenas for james attorney former loretta lynch, demanding they answer questions about the doj's actions during the presidential noting that the chairman issued subpoenas late wednesday for them to get testimony on the record before democrats take the house in january. the committee requested private depositions from james comey on december 3 and loretta lynch on december 4. james comey, who has burned recent request to testify confirmed on twitter that he had

received subpoenas and will refuse to testify unless it is public. jacksonville, florida, retired. caller: good morning. mr. trump is doing a good job. he came out for us. it is time to protect us. jobs, that we lost a long time ago. jobs are going overseas. we have been hurting. a lot of them are low-paying jobs. they will become the high-paying jobs in the future. i see jobs changing all the time. we all have to get up and go to trade schools and learn them, or you're not going to get a high-paying job. you have to learn.

we should always work with donald trump. donald trump, he was a good leader, he still is and he is trying to keep us there, giant trying to bring things back at our fathers fought for this country for. what do we stand for? but our fathers have fought our country for. host: on twitter "i saw my soybean farmer friend, who was heet during obama, but said is proud to help trump but lost one third of his profit this year. i just don't understand." business owner, good morning. go ahead. caller: i wanted to say briefly, i think president trump has done a good job. or,ink, i guess, mindset his goals to bring corporations backing this country is

different than what obama was pushing for. therefore, people are more optimistic. i think people need to educate themselves, read the wall street journal, look at what is changing or what is happening on the economy. i think there is a lot of democrats probably eating then,e tax dollars and therefore there is a lot of division in our country. they want to protect their jobs. not all. but the basics of that. i am hopeful for the future. i think that the deficit is something that really needs to andractically gone after done something about and uh,

let's hope the politicians actually get something done in that respect. thank you. host: more on president trump from the washington post, about his message yesterday over the span of ours, mixing thanksgiving tidings with renouncing the findings of central intelligence agency, criticizing court decisions, attacking hillary clinton, misstating facts about the economy, quoting a shutdown of the economy and jousting with the news media. asked what he was most than before on the holiday, a question that commanders in chief usually prompt praise for service members and harm's way, trump delivered a trumpian answer. i made a tremendous difference in our country. focus on the comments, on the court system in the united states.

the ninth circuit court of appeals "a thorn in our side. >> we're getting hurt by the ninth circuit very badly. everyone files in the ninth circuit. i have not seen anyone file in anywhere else. they can go anyplace in the country. i think we have to stop that somehow. the judges will have to get together, congress has to get together and stop it. they are taking advantage of our country by filing insistently and always, just about that i see, in the ninth circuit. even our legislation that we did have passed, that failed in the ninth circuit, in the ninth circuit appeal, then in the supreme court. that is a shame. it is hurting people, law enforcement. now that the military is on the border, it is really hurting our military. frankly, when they hear these decisions, these are

professionals. responders, they cannot believe the decisions being made by these judges. this is what they do. they do law enforcement. law and order. they get these decisions and say -- who makes these decisions? they are not into lawyer things. who makes these decisions? who are the people that are giving these decisions, that will make it unsafe for us, meaning law enforcement and military and making it unsafe for the united states? despite that, we have a powerful border and a lot of good things are happening. from that usa today story about the comments on the court. remarks followed a ruling monday, halting the administration's attempt for application for asylum.

trump doubling down on his complaints about the court, despite a rare rebuke on wednesday by supreme court justice john roberts who said "there are no obama judges or trump judges but and i sure know a group of dedicated judges doing their level best to bring equal rights to those appearing before them. go asking for your view of the economy on black friday. indiana, employed, good morning. caller: good morning. i was not expecting what you just put on there. those excerpts. wow, trump is thankful for himself over thanksgiving. mind blowing. i that is not dictatorish, don't know what is. back to jobs. i am employed. i understand the job rate, unemployment rate is lower than

it is other than -- than it has ever been but i think the thing we're not addressing is wage inequality. when it takes two or three jobs for someone to make rent, that is not full employment. perhaps it is employment but folks are not able -- [indiscernible] that has to be addressed. wall street, as good as it is doing, that does not seem to trickle down to the working folks, such as myself. host: thanks. owner.arolina, business what kind of business? caller: i'm from the technology industry. i have been blessed. i have made additional investments. striking, i am impressed.

i think this is one of the last few places where journalism still exists. the media is overwhelmingly, you tune in and hear people pinioned, not facts. this is so refreshing. theoint of view is, i think president is doing an incredible job. the parameters -- i'm disappointed there is so much disingenuous people that you know when the president is from your party, he is perfect. when he is not, he is imperfect. i think we can look objectively at what he has done in terms of wemoting capital investing, have someone in the white house who is in support of small business and large business. that is a dramatic psychological shift and practical shift in terms of regulation. host: how did that tax cut law

impact your business? k1, the wayously, 20%l businesses, getting off the top immediately. guess what? there is a significant additional amount of income coming in. then i have a choice whether i invest in a business, or keep the profits and spend some? that is a tangible way in which small businesses are benefited. host: what will you do? caller: combination of things. we invested in another business, in expectation. retained for future investments like expansions and some of it will be invested in startups. host: thank you for the call. john, john stumpf, pennsylvania, retired. promised to bring

the coal industry back. i have an article in a local paper. four companies have filed for bankruptcy in the coal industry in the last 2 years. the westmore the company, one of the largest, $1.4 billion of debt. the problem is, these places we exported coal, china and india have canceled projects as they seek to reduce air pollution. trump's campaign should be promises, promises. thank you. host: harry is in baltimore, maryland, retired. caller: my name is harry. in 12 years, i have been retired, up until last year i never got a raise. $30, then this year, i will get $45 raise in social

security. it amazes people that it amazes me how people are unhappy. they turn around and complain about not making enough money. if they start -- if they stop charging things it will be fine. i'm 73 years old. i worked all my life. i expect young people to work for this country. have a nice day. host: you're not bothering us by calling in. we appreciate the calls. sarah on facebook saying "we are headed for recession that will make a last one look like a walk in the park." than is says "the economy could be better for those who work." that will do it for the program. we were back tomorrow morning at 7 a.m. eastern, in the meantime, have a great black friday.

[captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2017] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] ♪ this weekend on c-span, photojournalists talk about their favorite photographs on the campaign trail. >> you look at the light first, and then you work hard, because there is always a story to tell. this is political theater. show what try to these people are like and are about. book tv on c-span two saturday at 8:00 p.m. eastern, lindsay a darya talks about

photo she is taken in the middle east. >> there is a call to arms and they went, and we went with them. as we were hit by troops and there were airstrikes at the time, there were tank rounds, fire, it was a relentless. these guys would often run away and leave the journalists on the front line. we had to run away after them. american history tv, c-span3, saturday at 8:00 p.m. eastern, how the pilgrims became a part of america's founding story. >> why they have become important is because they could be used to give america a noble identity, or a noble cause. we hear that the pilgrims came for freedom, god, or self-government. for thoseey came reasons, that is what america stands for. >>