the local court records were lost including the transcript. it was thousands of pages and every word spoken by every witness during the trial which really helped me after it was found. that record early helped me together the sequence of events in washington those two days. >> sunday night at 8:00 eastern. calls, texts and tweets. ♪ host: good morning. it is saturday, december 17. this thursday, the house judiciary sub meeting held a

hearing on a limited and gum violence. december 14 marked 10 years since a gunman killed 20 children between the ages of six and seven. we would like to know what gun violence solutions you support. in the eastern and central time zones, give us a call at (202) 748-8000. mountain and pacific, call (202) 748-8001. we have a special line set up for gun owners. if you own a gun, it is (202) 748-8002. you can send us a text at (202) 748-8003. be sure to send your first name and city and state. we are on social media, facebook.com/c-span, and twitter, @cspanwj. welcome to washington journal. i want to show you a gallup poll from last month. the headline, diminished majority supports stricter gun laws in the u.s.

the article starts this way. americans support for stricter u.s. gun laws has receded after increasing in the wake of two mass shootings in the spring. 57% of u.s. adult now think laws covering the sale of firearms should be made more strict, down from 66% in june. current support is above the 52% measured in october of 2021 and matches the 2020 reading. here are some graphs to show you. this is americans desire for stricter gun laws since 1990. you can see the number on top is the percent that want more strict, the middle cap as now, and less strict. then they show you here by party affiliation.

here is democrats, independents, and republicans. gun ownership in the u.s. has held steady. at a hearing last week on gun violence that i mentioned, texas democrat sheila jackson lee spoke on the need for more laws to protect children. [video clip] >> victims, and these are babies, were also failed to this country's -- failed by this country's gun laws. texas and federal law allowed those guns to be purchased at 18. uvalde shooter approached people to buy him guns before he turned 18 that they refused. as soon as he turned 18, he purchased two ar-15 style rifles. it is important to note that

shooter had already purchased 60 30 round magazines. in some states, the shooter's behavior might have allowed someone to raise a red flag and alert authorities he might be a danger to others, but texas had no such law. the shooter from we banned the sale of assault weapons for 10 years. when it expired, we saw a tripling in the number of active shooter incidents, a tripling of the number of people murdered in those incidents, and mass shootings have continued unabated. host: representative sheila jackson lee of taxes. at the same hearing, arizona republican andy criticized efforts to deal with the violence by curbing the second amendment.

[video clip] >> despite the title of the hearing, there has not been an honest engagement in search for bipartisan solutions, mostly because there's only one solution for my friends across the aisle, set emasculate -- to emasculate the second amendment. for proof, look at the bills they have introduced or brought through the committee in the 117th congress. they have pushed legislation to infringe on the rights of law-abiding americans, certain semiautomatic firearms, establishing new federal databases and a national firearm registry. those proposals, gun law experts have explained, will do nothing to end gun violence or the milieux -- or the criminal

use of guns. president biden stated, a nine millimeter bullet -- there is no rational basis for high-caliber weapons in terms of self protection. remember, the second amendment was never absolute. law enforcement, military and ballistic experts agree that those claims are nonsense. host: that was representative andy biggs, a republican. we are asking you what gun violence solutions would you support? we have our phone lines by region. mountain and pacific -- eastern and central, it is (202) 748-8000. mountain and pacific, (202) 748-8001. if you are a gun owner, (202) 748-8002. let's start with vincent, a gun owner in gaithersburg, maryland.

caller: good morning. happy holidays. my comment is it always takes, because of who we are as human beings, it will always take one good person to stop the bad person. there are a million laws on the books. it will not stop. to fight the hatred of human nature, we have one million laws. i will say one thing in regards to laws. police enforced our immigration laws. we have the laws. they just have to be enforced. host: how is that related to gun violence, vincent? caller: because when this flood opens up and these people, you

cannot blame them -- these people come, you cannot blame them. because it is laws. we have to enforce the laws and have enough common sense to see where, yes, laws do play a very important part in our american society. host: got it. next to david in memphis, tennessee. good morning. caller: i am calling to talk about shinzo abe, the former prime minister of japan. japan has some of the world's strictest gun laws. the fellow who shot him used a handmade gun. i had to rethink gun ownership since then. all the prohibitions in the world did not prevent this from happening. thank you for giving me time to tell my information. host: staying in tennessee,

lebanon, tennessee, carl. good morning. caller: good morning. host: what do you think? caller: there needs to be gun manufacturers to be held accountable. there immunity should be removed and the owners should be able to buy back weapons. host: how would that work? caller: there's a liability for manufacturers. manufacturers have made guns sexy. they have made them attractive. and it is similar to a bass boat. if the fish are biting, you can catch as many fish out of a canoe as you can out of a $60,000 fantasy, flashy

bass boat. gun manufacturers have made an effort to make guns sexy and attractive. host: let's look at the new york times. this is an article with the headline, childhood positive greatest danger -- childhood positive greatest danger. gun violence recently surpassed car accidents as the leading cause of death for american children. and much of the nation's history, disease was the number one killer of children, then, by the 1960's, car crashes. well after the advent of the seatbelt, an american child was still three times as likely to die a car accident as a firearm. we are now living in the era of the gun. take a look at this graph. this is from 2020 to -- sorry,

2000 to 2020. this is the line for 10%. it has things like cancer here. here is the share of deaths from motor vehicle crashes. you can see the sharp decline. this is the line, this blue line, for gun deaths of children ages one to 18. let's take a look at some texts and tweets that we are getting. this is from elaine in massachusetts. she says, i heard a program suggesting making gun ownership rules similar to rmv and education and discounts toward safes. here is terry in laurel city, florida. stop sealing records of non-adults violent crimes and crimes from background

checks. this is a tweet. the root cause of gun violence is glorification. all our most popular movies are about good guys solving problems with guns. our most popular video games are first person shooters. even popular music glorifies gun violence. what's your next from terry, a gun owner in columbia, new jersey. good morning. host: good morning. i don't believe you should reduce -- should make stronger gun laws. we should be able to carry whatever might be coming at us. as far as children being killed, i believe that most of that is because people do not keep their guns locked up in their homes. that is how children are getting killed. host: what is a good way to encourage more people to lock up their guns at home? caller: there's an advertisement

on tv now, which i think is good. it tells people that they -- when they knock on the door and let their kid in to somebody's house, they should ask, do you have any guns that are not locked up? host: all right. take a look at the guardian. this is an article with the headline, americans bought in the decade -- bought at least 150 million guns in the decade since the sandy hook shooting, which may lead to more firearm deaths. it says in a country where the leading cause of gun deaths is gun suicide, experts say a growth and gun ownership is likely to lead to more deaths. in the years since the shooting

at sandy hook, the u.s. gun safety movement has gained some political power, while the nra has been weekend by internal disputes and legal battles. at the same time, overall gun under ship in the u.s. -- gun ownership in the u.s. appears to have grown. let's see what you think about that and what gun violence solutions you would support. anything new or some things he would want to see. let's take a look at that hearing. the house judiciary subcommittee. we heard from christian heinie. he lost his parents to gun violence and offered his take on what policies legislators should concentrate on. [video clip] >> after years of working in the gun violence prevention movement, i have realized the only remarkable part of my story is how unremarkable it is.

our lives were forever altered. we have joined an ever-growing club of people devastated by an epidemic of gun violence that continues to rage on with a level of regularity no other industrialized country allows. so much of this pain and anguish is inextricably tied to failures of policy. we are discussing the bipartisan solution to gun violence within the context of a horrific mass murder that took lace -- took place in uvalde, texas. another devastating attack on a school. we also hold this conversation to near zen one day after the heinous shooting -- conversation 10 years and one day after the heinous shooting in sandy hook. the answer is simple. from gun violence when our leaders have done so little to prevent it.

10 years and more than one million gun deaths and injuries later, we are still here, in fight of the fact that the vast majority of gun owners overwhelmingly support policy that can prevent it. by strengthening the background system, by investing in communities, reducing rates of suicide, domestic violence and unintentional shootings by requiring the storage of firearms, and mitigating mass shootings by reinstating the band on assault weapons and large capacity magazines. guns are not the solution. that is a myth perpetuated by an industry that wants to sell more guns. if more guns made us safer, we would already be the safest country on the planet. host: we are asking you what gun control measures you support.

marty is on the phone in newport news, virginia. he's a gun owner. caller: this is the first time i have called. as far as the ar-16s, it is not that they need to be outlawed. it is that to purchase one you need an fbi clearance. you have to pass a psychological evaluation every year. things like that. i am asking the viewers to take a look at that guy, that kid that shot at the school in parkland. just for my sense, you know, looking at that kid, there is

something, just about his picture -- he's not screwed on right. his head is not screwed on right. host: do you support red flag laws? do you think the government can come in and say i think you might be a threat? i'm going to take your guns away. caller: yeah. if enough credible evidence is there, yeah. host: next caller in ohio. caller: my feelings would be on a federal level, say, the presidential level. i believe the president should basically come up with a terroristic law. if you use -- if you brandish a

weapon in any type of crime, say, carjacking, robbery at a 7-eleven, any type of -- you know, terroristic act with any type of weapon, that it be punishable by death. i think everyone is just out of control with shooting, you know, daily. our local news is inundated with multiple shootings. there is something that has to deter it. there is no deterrent. it just seems likely keep throwing money and new laws and nothing seems to fix the issue. to me, there needs to be a deterrent. and, you know, my thought is, if you are standing in a 7-eleven or a bank and someone comes to

rob it, that is one of the scariest thoughts, you know, a human being could face. to me, it is a terroristic act. host: let's talk to rob next in new york and a gun owner. hi. caller: good morning. there's forward you ought to remember. shall not be infringed. this is ridiculous. c-span at it again. you're always trying to stir the pot. if you want to do the -- do some good, pull up those 50 intelligence professionals who said hunter's laptop was misinformation. this gun owners stuff is nonsense. shall not be infringed. thanks. host: ok. rob is reminding everybody about the second amendment, which says this. ll regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and their arms

shalnobe infringed. let's talk next to ed, ocean city, new jersey. hello. caller: no guns, period, concluding for hunting. england, holland, japan, australia, china, vietnam, no one has a gun, and they had a handful of gun owners all of -- of gun murders all of next -- all of last year. the quaker solutions are the key. they are absolutist. no guns, no wars. host: all right. this is an opinion piece in newsweek. the headline says, it is time to admit it, the democrats gun control laws are racist. that is by jeff charles. he shows this graph. this is firearm homicide rates and then by -- homicide

rates in men by race. he says pushing for more gun restrictions on law-abiding gun owners is not the wrong approach. it will directly contribute to the problem that needs solving. curbing legal gun ownership has a disproportionately negative impact on black americans because it hinders their ability to defend themselves from law enforcement -- themselves when law enforcement fails to do so. we will go to doug in munford, tennessee, a gun owner. hi, died. caller: there used to be a show called the rifleman. he taught his boy that a gun is only a tool. it is a tool in man's toolbox like any other tool. it is only as good or bad as the man using it. the problem with our country is not the guns. it is the people using the guns.

they ought to teach gun safety in school, teach kids the proper use of firearms, but taking guns away is not the answer. thank you for your time. host: ok. let's take a look at some things from social media. here is a text from william in middletown, connecticut. stronger background checks, raise age for first purchase, require safety course requirement -- a couple people have talked about that -- and check social media for violent tendencies, national registry for owners and tracking weapons. this is a tweet that says the real solution to gun violence is not banning guns. it is enforcing the current laws that require long prison sentences for anyone using a firearm in the commission of a crime. disarming law-abiding citizens only means reading more -- only

means creating more vulnerable victims. here is a text from ken in vermont. if factors like movies and video games are called -- are at fault for gun violence, why do women commit almost f the gun violence crimes? next from will, in anrs, south carolina. caller: how are you? host: i am good. caller: enjoy yow. i am a gun owner mysel i have been one for years. i am in favor of some kind of retion. it is crazy. there's been an explosion in the past few years since the assault weapon ban was lifted improperly, in my opinion, in the manufacture of new guns, so now they are flooding the streets. they are everywhere.

the kids are picking them up, you now, when mom is away or whatever, and then, you now, they go slaughter a bunch of kids in schools or whatever. it is out of control. the absolutists -- one of your earlier scholars said, shall not be infringed. they get hung up on that and forget about the well regulated militia part. that is actually in there too. the nra, if you go back and look, is largely financed by gun manufacturers and absolutely infiltrated with vladimir putin's agents, i think. there were quite a few cases of them being involved in the nra simply because it is so divisive and deadly for this country. i have guns, as i said.

i use it to protect my home. but these people who want to go out and carry guns everywhere, you know, i call them ammo sexuals because they get off on it. i am a real estate broker. i have to have continuing education to that license -- to keep that license. for a driver's license, i need continuing education and insurance. yet just to go get a gun that can take out a large population of people, none of that is required and agreeable to buy these absolutists. host: let's hear from a gun owner in mount union, pennsylvania, kurt. good morning. caller: how are you? merry christmas. host: merry christmas to you. caller: it is coming up so i am wishing you a merry christmas. we need to return to the values

we used to teach decades ago of god and the 10 commandments. if we instill in our children things like that 10 commandments that says thou shalt not kill and the judeo-christian values of respecting life, you will see a drop in these things when they start to understand that there's something more than just here. when we begin to instill things like drag queens, gender fluidity -- host: are you still there? caller: go ahead. host: you support things like expanded background checks? what do you think? caller: that is ok, but what i am telling you is that if you want to get to the root of the problem -- expanded background checks is like going out and spraying a weed with roundup.

you are killing the lead but you are not getting to the root of it -- the weed but you are not getting to the root of it. host: let's talk to charles in colorado. caller: how are you? host: ok. caller: my friend has over 45 guns in his house. i said, why do you have a 45 guns? he says, because he's scared. i am like, why are you scared? i have never undergone an no one has ever approached me or came into my house to rob me. i think we need to have some kind of laws that lower the amount of guns people have, not outlaw guns, but just the number of guns people can have. host: how many do you think would be reasonable? caller: two. one for hunting and one for home

protection. that is enough. i do not need to gun. i am good. if someone approaches me, i will use my two hands like my dad,. but most people, they feel like they need guns to feel safe in this world of ours and i disagree with it. you know, i am a mortician. i have to deal with gunshot wounds almost every day. monday morning, i will be dealing with a lady who lost her life. this is america. i am proud to be an american. i like your shadow. i watch it every saturday morning. host: at the hearing we were talking about earlier, the house judiciary committee meeting, they heard from the president of the crime prevention research center. he talks about the effectiveness of some gun-control measures. [video clip] >> background checks on the private transfers of guns.

there is not one mass public shooting the century that would have been stopped if such a law had been in effect and perfectly enforced. no one is talking about the massive errors in the background check system and how it overwhelmingly discriminates against black and hispanic males being able to defend themselves. we hear calls for bands of so-called assault weapons. the vast majority of firearms in the u.s., including assault weapons, are semi-automatic guns that function -- that are functionally identical. given the influential associated press stylebook acknowledged that the terms assault weapon and weapons of war convey little meaning at her highly politicized. the ap makes it clear that these firearms are not used by any military despite references.

an ar-15 functions exactly the same as any small caliber hunting rifle. the ending guns based on them looking like military weapons -- the key phrase is often military style -- makes no sense. planning all automatic guns, as president biden has repeatedly called for, would mainly affect law-abiding citizens. it is logically more consistent in banning military style weapons. it would make it more difficult for americans to use guns defensively. host: we are talking about what gun violence solutions you would support. we are taking your calls, texts and soci mia posts. here is rust in california. tons of material on how to make guns, convert your weapon to

automatic. you think more gun laws will help? get real. here is mike in orlando, florida. must be 21 to own or purchase a gun. none can be sold to civilians. no gun parts sold online. no gun shows, background checks that take 30 days to purchase. no use of a gun in a crime. minimum five year incarceration. here is mike in minnesota. i support restrictions on age, magazine size, ghost guns and military stifle rifles. i support red flag laws. nothing will change until gun people let it change. the slaughter of innocents will continue. let's talk next to bill in talladega, alabama, a gun owner. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. host: good morning.

go ahead. caller: this is my opinion only. all the laws that have been passed are not being enforced. you have states like new york, california, illinois, that have some of the toughest gun laws in our country, and the crime is out of control in those areas. do you agree with that statement? host: i am asking you your opinion, bill. caller: ok. here is my opinion. host: ok. caller: we don't need more laws. we need prosecutors and district attorneys to enforce the laws we have. it is that plain and simple. host: got it. caller: if you commit a crime with a gun, you should go to jail immediately, straight to jail, directly, and no get out

of jail free card like the district attorneys and judges are giving to people in the states where crime is the highest. thank you for taking my call. merry christmas. host: bellefonte, pennsylvania, greg. good morning. caller: yes. i feel they ought to bring back where in the 1800s someone commits a crime and hold a carnival and let everyone look and see what happens when you use a firearm on an individual. i don't think we need more laws on the books. just bring the laws back from the 1800s. capital punishment is the keyword. thank you. host: all right. take a look at attacks from bob in hometown, illinois. "stop the revolving door.

keep the criminals locked up. we do not need more laws. enforce the laws on the books. everyone knows who the offenders are. we better get serious soon. our country is in trouble." a text from greg in cleveland, ohio. "there is no solution to curb gun violence. people resort to guns rather than apply critical thinking. the schools are overrun with young, violent children to become violent adult. this all starts at home." jeff is calling us from centerville, tennessee, a gun owner. hi, jeff. caller: the biggest thing i see is the -- just how they trick the words. they tried to blame the manufacturer. legal gun owners by these weapons.

there is such demand for stolen weapons. that is it. they are getting to the street. they go, it was sold at this dealer, but the demand is so high, that is all these kids are doing, stealing weapons. the other thing is it is the trigger polars. my god. they used to fight with their fists. it is the trigger pullers. everybody knows that. and, you know, they are trying to take these weapons. everything i said is true. this other thing is true. rape, robbery, murder. at least 3 million times a year, legal gun owners stop this. i have done this over my 30, 40

years of caring a weapon -- of carrying a weapon. i have quelled violent crime. they go the other way. this is america. we are always going to have them. we sure need them with our government. you know, they trick the words. trust me. these guns are illegal guns. they are bought and stolen and they say, oh, these manufacturers. you have a question? host: i heard you. vaccine is in clinton township -- maxine is in clinton township, michigan. caller: the caller from pennsylvania was on the right track. i am a first generation ghetto child from detroit, michigan. i am 83 years old and i have seen the changes in our culture.

when i was a child, we would go to the movies on saturday, matinees, and watched cowboys shooting each other. we knew that was wrong. we also knew that mom was at home rocking the cradle. she was not outdoing her own thing and having abortions. our culture has gotten to the point where we may never recover. you cannot pass enough laws to protect yourself. the only thing you can do is buy your own gun for yourself protection and stop listening to these politicians who all they want to do is get votes. our culture has gone too far. we may never recover. look at what we have got. i watch the news in the morning and all it is is who shot.

you got the electric chair and that was fearful enough. our culture has gone too far. i hope these politicians would wise up and stop trying to sell us there lala. host: all right. james is a gun owner in fort worth, texas. caller: good morning. thank you for c-span. i am a gun owner. i own one pistol with one clip. i own a small caliber shotgun. that is enough to protect me and my home. i am not against gun ownership. i am against arsenal ownership. i don't think military weapons should be sold to civilians. we have no need for ar-15's. the only thing you could add to my collection, if i was a hunter, would be a hunting rifle. but an arsenal, a closet full of boxes full of ammunition and military weapons, do not belong

in the hands of civilians. i just cannot see anything any further than that. the answer to violence is not more violence. if the government will kill people, then the people will kill people. the death penalty needs to be a last resort for the most heinous crimes, but you don't need an arsenal and you don't need military weapons. i can protect myself. thank you for c-span and for listening. host: let's hear from kent in norfolk, virginia. banning drugs and alcohol did not prevent many from indulging. what needs to be addressed are why are more individuals feeling angry, alienated to the point of expressing their frustration and hate violently? rather, it is by guns, knives, driving cars into crowds, or homemade bombs. this is mary jo. she says my right to life -- to

live overrides anybody's right to bear arms. we need to change the amendment. we do not live in the world of musket times. we have a right to live and we cannot make a school as safe as the average courthouse. let's go to bert in waynesburg, kentucky. caller: how are you doing this morning? host: i am ok. caller: that is good. i hope i do not start rambling because there are so many issues we could talk about now. kind of what we said with the last thing here. our society, a society of violence, drugs, and it kind of relates to our border. now, biden is allowing millions of people to come across our

border. we are making the mexican cartels so rich that we do not even get fenton -- get fentanyl hardly any more from china. the material comes from mexico. host: let's stay on gun violence. but gun violence solutions do you support --what gun violence solutions do you support? caller: what can we do in schools? every time there is a shooting, we hear, what are the causes? guns. well, it is more than guns. we talked about how to make schools more secure over the last -- i think the last time we had it. it takes a lot of money. well, they want to make things more sick -- more secure at

the schools, but when it comes to the money to do it, we don't hear anything about it anymore. host: speaking of schools, at the hearing this week on gun violence, members of congress heard testimony from a survivor of the sandy hook elementary school shooting. [video clip] >> i was sitting on the carpet with my classmates, waiting for the teacher to give directions for the day. we heard what sounded like large metal pans being smashed together coming from the hallway. my teacher ran to the door to see if anyone was in the hall and pulled two students in our classroom to join us in lockdown. she shut the door and turned off all the lights. as the gunshots continued to ring, we huddled, and my teacher pulled over a desk and

grabbed a book to read to us so we could calm down. she began to heavily shake and i knew we were in danger. i felt a strong sense of nausea, over me as i thought i would be the first to die if the gunmen came into our classroom. we heard a knock and shake on the door handle. after deciding to open the door, we were evacuated out of the school by the police and taken to the firehouse nearby to reunite with our families. the firehouse was chaotic and everyone was running around yelling, looking for their children, as everything was so unclear. i went home that day and my town entered the most horrific aftermath after finding out 26 innocent souls were taken from us that day. in less than five minutes, an ar-15 fired 154 bullets, killing 26 people. how do we continue to allow this?

i have grown up in a world where the unimaginable happens over and over again, uncovering trauma over and over again. i am here not only because of the trauma i have endured in the past, but also because i am terrified of it happening again. we live in the constant aftermath of inaction from our lawmakers. host: we are asking you about what gun violence solutions you woulort this morning for another 15 minut. let's hear next from alexandra in spokane washington, a gun owner. good morning. caller: how are you? host: good. caller: therere a couple points i would like to make. some others have already made th. i would like to reiterate. the second amendment d a well regulated militia, which meere some educationn the proper use and respect for

your weapon. also, on the other side, i should be able town whatever weapon may be used against me. the idea that nothing in this country will ever help it, what made me think that, was just proven by january 6. if it was successful, i do not want to think about would be going on. mental health and poverty eradication are two basic foundational things that would have a direct pack on gun violence -- direct impact on gun violence. it feels to those people that nothing is fair in life. for many people, that is true. it is a small percentage of

people in terms of how many people live in this country that commit those gun crimes. the answer is not going back to a more barbaric time of killing everybody if we don't like how they behave. and one life is as great a loss as many lives. i know people with children are not going to like that, but if you have a family member, regardless of their age, whether it is one or all, it is devastating. the answer is to get to the root of the problem, which is mental health and poverty eradication. host: all right, alexandra. eric is in california. hello. caller: good morning, america. i would like to speak to the heart and mind of the solution. if you are willing to die for this country, you are not willing to turn the other cheek

when your family member slaps you? a gun does not protect your family from the flood, earthquake or any of these things. we have been misled by politicians. we have all been corrupted. it is a change of hearts we need to have. again, if you are not willing to turn the other cheek -- host: i am not sure what you mean. turning the other cheek from what? explain that, eric. caller: your neighbor's violence, anger. the word of god tells us to not be so violent when this stuff is going down. we have to learn, again, what the word of god really means, and it does not mean you should pick up a gun. you should have these things to protect yourself. we are blessed in america.

and most people do not live within 50 miles from where they were raised. so who do you plan on shooting? who are you scared of? host: let's take a look at a tweet from harry. i support zero tolerance enforcement, mandatory minimum sentences and a prohibition on plea dealing for those charged with gun crimes. a text from joellen in his slit, new york says it is not gun violence. it is criminal violence. get back to the government enforcing federal law. sandy tweets this, i loved when i traveled to japan and singapore and there were no guns. i could go anywhere and not worry about being a victim of gun violence. lloyd is in kearney's villa, west virginia, gun owner.

hi. caller: hello. go ahead and take the guns. see what happens. i guarantee you the violence will not slow down much. if somebody wants to kill somebody, they are going to do it. the killing is in the person, not in the weapon. so go ahead. i say enforce the laws and give them the proper punishment that they need. bring it back, capital punishment, and quit talking about all this and do something about it. they are just rambling on. they have been doing this for years. go on and take the guns and see what happens. but i guarantee you, it will not get better. it is in the people. host: this is what steve sends us by tweet.

i like the idea of a gun buyback. i have been trying to sell an older gun and cannot find a buyer. if the government will buy it for me, that will free up some cash. i hope that makes a point. shannon is next. caller: good morning, mimi. host: good morning. caller: i am all about, you know, being able to prove you are a capable and competent person to handle a firearm. if we were to be serious, we should start with the fact that a male's brain -- this is a serious, psychologically proven -- does not fully developed until they are 25, so why are we giving anybody under 25 a deadly weapon? i don't understand. we should also do a civics test. if you cannot pass a simple civics test to prove you can understand how this country

works, you should not own a gun. if your social media posts show you have tendencies of violence, you should not own a gun. you should have a psych evaluation. that is for sure. but for me, the one thing we have never tried in this country for 240 years is letting women start making some laws. when is that going to happen? if women had a hand in making these laws the video you just showed about -- laws and looking at the video you just showed, even though she's not my grandchild or child, she lost friends. she almost lost her life and each of us should be able to say, that could be my granddaughter. that could be my daughter. and god for bid. we don't want that to happen again.

so let's be serious. the hypocrites that keep calling in -- what makes me so angry is ashli babbitt. she opened the people's house and was shot. that is what any of these people would do. they would shoot the person coming into their home. ashli babbitt did the same thing. that was unfortunate, but that is a law we have to protect ourselves. she came into the people's house. she deserved to be shot as well as others. but that didn't happen. one more thing, if i could. if we want congress to look at things different, if we want to look at uvalde and all the hype about should we show the video of what happened inside that school, i say yes, but instead of showing the shoes of children laying there, how about mitch

mcconnell's grandson laying there? if we made it more real, i think more people would stand up and take notice. thanks and i hope you have a great day in the merry christmas to you -- day and a merry christmas to you and everybody listening. host: brad in lilly, kentucky is a gun owner. good morning. caller: i have a problem with what that lady said, that more people should have been shot. it was an unarmed woman protesting. she should not have been shot. you should not have let her continue talking about whatever she was. there is a gun violence problem. it is not with american civilians. we have 400 million guns. the military has 4.5 million. if there was a gun problem among civilians, we would know about it. the problem lies with the military-industrial complex and the weapons we send around the

world. cbs reported 70% of the weapons that go to ukraine don't make it to where they are supposed to go. democrats are now arguing there should be no oversight of that. we left 64,000 machine guns, 358,000 assault rifles and 120 6000 pistols, making the taliban the world's most heavily armed terrorist group when we pulled out. host: how does that relate to gun violence in the united states? caller: your question was what gun violence solutions what i support. host: what do you think? not sending military weapons overseas? caller: gun violence is gun violence. we have sent $17.6 billion worth of arms to saudi arabia between 2010 and 2020. that's a problem. host: you own a gun.

do you own any assault rifles? do you think they should be banned? caller: i do not think they should be. i said at the outset that if there was a problem with gun violence among civilians, we would know about it. there are more guns than there are american people. you know. it is not a catastrophic problem. what is the problem is the violence that is perpetrated with our weapons overseas. this will blow back towards us. host: got it. frank in texas, good morning. caller: yes. i would like to say there are wonderful christian and wonderful african-american young people being murdered, black on black crime in chicago, baltimore, l.a., atlanta,

wonderful young black men killing each other by the thousands with illegal guns, illegal guns, but i would say this. my cousin was a long haul truck driver. he was delivering groceries up town in baltimore and an african-american gang busted out his windshield -- his side glass, drug him out of the tribe, beat him half -- out of the truck, beat him half to death, and shot him. c-span does knowledge and talk about gang violence. they don't want to talk about what is happening in chicago, baltimore, l.a., atlanta, and other cities. they don't want to cover the gang violence. there is christian african-americans out there, that you have a serious problem -- they are, but you have a

serious problem. god for bid uvalde and all that talk about -- all that. you talk about multiple thousands of people being murdered in chicago every year ending you do not want to talk about that. host: here is a text from charles in indiana, who says no one talks about the victims that are shot and what it costs to recover. congress should tax guns and ammo 100% like cigarettes. the money should be used for victims to recover. raise the cost to reduce sales. toby is in florida, a gun owner. caller: how are you doing? host: good. caller: i wanted to say we keep talking about the guns, but it

is not a gun killing anybody. it is the person behind the gun. and that person has to take responsibility for their actions. it is not an ar-15 killing people and stuff like that. it is somebody behind that weapon. wrong with owning one. i am an american. i can own as many guns as i want. that doesn't mean that i am not responsible. host: what people say about wanting to ban automatic weapons is it is so much easier to kill quickly and a lot of people. so are they necessary? caller: it is your right. you can own whatever you want. i mean, it is your right to own

any kind of weapon you want. if you want to own that, they are for sale. you are an american. you are an american taxpayer and an american citizen. you should be able to own that type of weapon. it is the hands -- when they sell it to somebody that has a mental problem or is willing to commit a crime or something. that becomes the problem. the person behind that weapon. so when you use a weapon like that to kill innocent people, you should pay the consequences, should pay the consequences point-blank. host: dan is in georgetown, massachusetts. good morning. caller: how are you? host: good. caller: i have a couple of laws and regulations that i think might help. it is a different perspective.

but, i think what needs to happen, in this world of misinformation coming from all directions, basically we -- american citizens are being flooded with misinformation. more specifically i am going to say propaganda. and a way to get a better handle on this is that we need to have better control of what the fbi is up to, ok? i am sorry to say, they are a loose gone, so to speak. a of shady things happening, and a lot of government control, governmental authority that we are seeing. and i will tell you, in 2012, we

slipped into a national defense authorization act was something called smith mund re-modernization act. and what that did was that it allowed the pentagon to use money and to collaborate with, get this, and no kidding, the media to mislead the public if it is in the interest of the government. so, if you look, starting in 2012 -- mr. hewitt: i hate to do that -- host: i hate to do this but we are out of time for this hour. coming up retired marine corps reserve colonel and senior advisor at ci at -- csis mark cancian. he will discuss the ukraine crisis and weapons being provided by the u.s. and nato. later it is our weekly spot --

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>> washington journal continues. host: welcome back. we will be talking about russia-ukraine conflict and the new missiles and weapons going to ukraine. my guess is a retired old -- is the retired colonel mark cancian, the senior advisor at csis. welcome to the program. guest: thank you. host: let us talk about the patriot missile system. reports are that the united states will be sending that to ukraine. can you describe what that is? guest: sure, the patriot missile system is really the gold standard of missile systems, the high end ground-based air defense consisting of a radar, a command and control center and then hiring units.

it has a range of about 50 miles. it is very good at finding and tracking adversary aircraft, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles. so that, it has a wide range of capabilities. the downside is that it is quite expensive and complicated to operate. host: i was going to ask you about the complicated part. how much training will be required and at what point will the ukrainians he able to operate a? guest: the ukrainians have shown that they are very trainable and they adapt quickly. but the patriot is by far the most complex piece of equipment that we have given them. just to give them a sense, the course runs 53 weeks. now, the other specialties do not take quite as long, 20 to 13 weeks. the ukrainians can speed that up by selecting people who have worked in the field and do not

need to get trained on the basics. still, it will take time. i have heard that the administration wants to send these in february which is awfully quickly. host: a reminder that if you would like to call and ask a question we have our line set up by party affiliation. republicans, 202-748-8001. democrats, 202-748-8000. and independents, 202-748-8002. you can start calling in now. you said that they would get there and maybe in about february and there would be training involved. what was the impetus for sending it now? guest: it clearly was the russian attacks on ukrainian infrastructure, the russians since about october have targeted the utilities, particularly the electrical grid in ukraine. they had not done that before,

it had mostly been attacking military targets. as a result there has been a lot of hardship for the people as they do not have electricity and the water is not working well. so the ukrainians and their president have been pleading for air defense asset and nato has sent some. the united states sent four avengers and 1600 stingers, which are handheld antiaircraft devices. the problem is that neither the united states nor nato have very much to give. at the end of the cold war they eliminated most of the ground-based air defense. we kept patriot primarily because of its ballistic missile defense capabilities but most of the rest we got rid of because the air force is we were facing iraq and iran were not very powerful so we did not need a lot of ground-based air defense. now the u.s. army is rebuilding

that and they have a number of programs and development but they are not yielded. the bottom line is that the ukrainians needed more air defense and there was not a lot to give them. we gave a couple of systems, so the administration decided to take the step of sending patriots despite the complexity and the cost. it is probably about a billion-dollar transfer. host: will it be effective against the russians? guest: there is no question it will be effective, it is a good system and it has been upgraded any times. it has been used in israel and saudi arabia. the problem is that we are sending a battery and that is enough to protect one city. so they might send it to protect kyiv. it is not going to put a dome overall of, just one city. and it cannot protect against

all threats either. it is very good against aircraft and cruise missiles and ballistic missiles. the problem is that the missiles for the patriot cost $4 million a piece. so you do not want to shoot a lot of them at $250,000 cruise missiles. and you certainly do not want to shoot them at $50,000 iranian drones. so it cannot protect against all threats and it is going to be limited geographically. but with that said, it will help protect some cities. host: what about the iron dome, which would come from israel? it is cheaper. isn't that a better solution? guest: the iron dome would also be a good solution. it is shorter range, and it cannot protect against as any of the threats as patriot. but it would be an excellent complement. the problem with iron dome is

that the united states has two systems that have been used in testing and we might send those. but israel has been reluctant to get involved. they have not been willing to send any of their systems. and the iron dome is developed and produced by israel. apparently they are bulking at letting the united states -- balking at letting the united states transfer it. it is helpful, but very limited. host: one more before we take calls and that is about high bar -- h -- high bar, how effect of that? guest: it has become the iconic weapon of the latter part of the war. it has a great capability and of course the rocket can go out 40 to 45 miles and they are guided by gps so that they are very good at attacking fixed installations.

they have been devastating bridges, ammo depots, headquarters. so, they have had a major effect. on the other hand it is not a silver bullet. they are very expensive and missiles are relatively limited. the launches are limited, ukrainians only have about 30 including the sister system. and as a result they need regular artillery and have been using that extensively. the ukrainian say of all the weapons out there, your basic canon artillery has been the most important. host: let us talk to some viewers. joshua is in oak grove, missouri. independent line. good morning. caller: good morning. the patriot missiles, are they effective against hypersonic? guest: great question. i do not know the answer. fortunately the russians do not

have many hypersonic. used a few during the first part of the war. and that basically stopped because i do not have any. but i think the answer is no, but i would have to say i am not sure. host: what is your interest in hypersonic? these are missiles that would go more than five type -- five times the speed of sound. caller: i was just -- i heard about china and russia having them, i did not know how many they had and how effective they were being used in ukraine. host: let us go to ron in michigan. democrat. caller: good morning. i am reading a book right now " the hidden nazi" which explains the ss's role in developing the supersonic missiles and both the russians and us took those. but this man who ran the program was probably one of the worst of the worst of war criminals but

he was taken in by our government and used as he had valuable information. just as general gallon had nazi intelligence to stop in russia and took a man and he was given -- he gave all the information that he had on russia and we incur -- inc. it. and so to this day we are using that information through the whole cold war. this is a culmination of world war ii to destroy the soviet union, and you know i hate to say it. the nazis took power but their philosophy which was incorporated into our government and our policies has been a policy ever since the cold war. just like the south lost the civil war that they gained power again and they rule in this country through white supremacy. host: we are kind of getting off the subject, if there is anything you would like to say about the nazi scientists coming

to the united states and working on the space program and the ballistic missile. guest: it is tero -- it is true that werner byron brown -- were in her -- werner von braun helped with early military developing. i would not qualify him as an ss agent but he served the nazi government. on the other hand i disagree with the notion that the philosophy was picked up by the united states government. i reject that. host: robin in alabama. it -- independent line. caller: good morning. i have a couple of questions. the first is are you just a retired general support given in a third world country like ukraine giving -- getting

defensive systems against russia. in the second question is what is your stand on gun violence in america? thank you. host: we are not talking about gun violence and he is a retired colonel that i am sure that he appreciates the promotion. guest: thank you for the promotion. yes and i'm going to defer on the gun violence. on the question of transferring sophisticated weapons to ukraine, i think they would protest that they are a third world country. they are european and quite developed in their economy. it is a fair question about tracking these weapons. and let me take a moment to talk about oversight. the united states has been transferring tens of thousands of weapons to ukraine. we send them to bases in mostly poland and then they are picked up by the ukrainians. we track them quite carefully so

that we know exactly what we have given to the ukrainians. we have some mechanisms for tracking where and how the ukrainians are using them. my personal argument is that we ought to beef up the oversight and afghanistan we had an organization we had cigar, and they oversaw or monitored or audited u.s. aid to the afghan government and terry. i think we are at that point now with ukraine early on. there did not seem to be any because we thought it might be short and funding might not be that large. now it looks like it will go on for some time. i think it is a fair question to say we ought to track the weapons and the money more carefully. i do not worry about the ukrainians compromising the

equipment. but there is some risk on the battlefield that the russians will get a hold of some of this. that is the nature of the thing. i think the need to maintain sustained ukrainian resistance makes it worthwhile, sending the systems. patriot, specifically. i am a little nervous about the ability of the ukrainians to use the system. if they had a year or two they could do it and they are quite a sophisticated country and they could take this equipment up. the problem is they are doing it and more time and quickly. i worried that some of this equipment might get sidelined and there might be accusations of waste which might undermine the bipartisan consensus that we have seen. host: we have a tweet from

another mark who says "why are we so invested in ukraine? don't we supply more money, equipment and support than all the nato countries combined? why aren't european countries giving more? do they not care about ukraine?" guest: we do give more about the europeans have given $80 million in military, he military and and economic support to the ukrainian government. and the united states have been complaining about the lack of european burden sharing and we have been doing that since the beginning of nato. we can go back to the 1950's and they have been complaining that the europeans are not doing enough and it is a long-standing criticism and i think it is valid. it is worth keeping pressure on the europeans step up. host: the defense department press briefing this week, the joint chief spokesperson

mentioned russian comments about the patriot missile system intentionally going to ukraine. take a listen and i will ask for your response. [video clip] >> i would say i find it ironic and tallying that officials -- telling that officials from a country that brutally attacked its neighbor in a brutal and illegal invasion and a campaign that is targeting and killing innocent civilians and destroying civilian infrastructure that they would choose to use words like provocative to describe defensive systems meant to save lives and protect civilians. despite russia's propaganda to portray themselves as victims, it is important to remember that russia is the aggressor and when it comes to escalation they can de-escalate today by withdrawing. and they can save countless of innocent lives they have chosen

to double down. the last thing i would say is that the u.s. is not at war with russia and we do not seek conflict. our focus is on providing ukraine with the security assistance that it needs to defend itself. we -- that is something we chose to do and will continue to do as long as it takes. [end video clip] host: you know the russians have said that if you guys in the patriot there will be " unpredictable consequences." is that something we should be worried about? guest: the russians always complain when we send a new piece of equipment. so this is like what they have done for a long time. i think it is an idle threat in the sense that they are doing everything they can. and the spokesperson is correct. this is a defensive system. it is not going to attack russia proper or even russian forces.

it will mostly be used against unmanned cruise missiles and ballistic missiles and some aircraft, but is essentially defensive. it is the opposite of escalatory. the second thing is that the russians at the beginning of the war but down two red lines, one was no invasion of the russian homeland and the other was no native -- no nato troops in ukraine. they have respected those lines. this provision of patriot does not cross the red lines so the russians will complain but in the end they will live with it. host: sterling in maryland on the democrats line. good morning. caller: good morning. a comment on a quest -- and a question. as far as the patriot goes we have been trying to piece meal the defense for future advances

in the country. but russia is not -- attacking civilian targets. when we go to war we blow up electric grids and water systems and bruises -- bridges museum of we want to. but as far as my question to the colonel, are we really prepared for what will happen when we put that system on the ground and the russians take it out and all of the troops in the vicinity? and is that what you want? thank you. guest: keep in mind we are not sending any troops. we will be training ukrainian troops to use the system and they will be the ones who are operating it. we have been emphatic that we are not sending any troops ukraine and as far as can be told, that provision has held. in terms of the vulnerability of patriot. that is true. the russians have said they will try and take it out.

radar is particularly vulnerable because it radiates. on the other hand the system is designed to be mobile so it can move around. and avoid detection. that will be a challenge and the ukrainians as part of the training will learn how to keep the system survivable on contested battlefields. but, at the end of the day it is a war. you take losses just as your adversary does and it is not impossible that the system could be attacked and destroyed. host: mark we have a question for you from text in doubt bridge -- and southbridge massachusetts. "can the colonel comments on the possibility on the apk to ukraine? guest: it is a guided missile launched particularly from helicopters.

and it would be useful. the problem is that the ukrainians have some helicopters , but they are very vulnerable over the battlefield, particularly in areas where the russians have been able to set up air defenses like in the donbass. it would be potentially useful, but narrow application because of the need and the small number of helicopters and the fact that they are restricted in the kinds of airspace where they can survive. host: don in washington. republican line. caller: good morning and merry christmas to you and the viewers. thank you for your service, colonel. i had one or two quick questions that i have noticed since this onset of this newest interaction

with ukraine and russia. i did read somewhere probably during last summer that all of the other nato nations have stopped sending money and arms as of last june and they have their own good reasons, they claim. what brought my attention is that we are the only wines through these last six to seven months sending anything. and then i also had a question concerning joe biden mentioning to the grads six or seven months ago about getting ready because they will be going to war in ukraine. and these guided missiles, i have seen stuff that it takes many months, almost years to even get around this type of machinery and weaponry with the intelligence. are you completely 100% sure

that americans are not and will not be in another and less war of two neighbors not our own? host: go ahead. guest: let me take your second question first which is about american troops going to fight in ukraine. and the biden administration have been clear that they are not going to do that. and nato has been clear that it will not do that. i think the chances of that happening are extremely remote. and biden, and he talks to the graduates, he talked about the possibility of conflict, not that he was sending them to you rain. in terms of the other question about the europeans. the europeans have been providing aid all along. the germans have just sent an

air defense system to ukraine. the british are training troops, they are providing basic training and boot camp for ukrainian troops in the u.k., the flow of supplies from nato countries has continued. it is not true that that stopped. as an earlier caller raise the question, are they doing enough? and certainly you can argue that they are not, but they are doing something. host: paul who is in omaha, nebraska. independent line. caller: good morning. is it possible for former soviet countries to have former soviet air systems when they are receiving newer defense systems? guest: absolutely. we have been doing that very aggressively, not just air

defense but across the board. this was what i called a win win win for these kinds of transfers. for example the east european got rid of their older soviet equipment that they have gotten. the ukrainians were able to get systems that they were already familiar with and the defense industry was able to sell more stuff so that the east europeans could now have nato compatible equipment not their old soviet equipment. so we sent air defense systems like bf 300 which is a little like patriot but a generation earlier. we are sending tanks, we have bought 90 tanks by the cze chs and we sent a lot of ammunition across the board and it is not just eastern europeans. they have had purchasing groups all over the globe, literally trying to buy up old soviet

equipment and ammunition and then feeding that to you the ukrainians because that is what most of their forces still use. host: we have a text that says " the more the patriot missiles are used easier it will be for the russians to the radar systems that track card -- targets and guide the missiles. i thought ukrainians had pretty good russian sams. guest: they did have thus -- this s300 system and quite a few of those. on the other hand the united states has probably bought the whole supply so we are not able to expand that any further. we had to do something or we felt pressured to do something and patriot was the next step. there is some risk of compromising technology. it is very unlikely that the system itself will be captured. of course it will be operating

far behind ukrainian lines but it is not impossible that one of the missiles could land in russian territory or the russians get a hold of it. on the other hand the system is operated by like 17 countries around the world and fired by the israelis and the saudi's and several others. so it has been used in combat and the russians have probably been able to get a hold of a downed missile at some point. host: jeremy in ohio. democrat line. caller: hello. so and i do not mean to backtrack. but we talk about the amount of money that the european union is contributing. but we are not talking about how is the european union contributing to the refugee crisis caused by this war, and i thank you. guest: sure.

the europeans and the e.u. specifically have been spending a lot of money on; the refugee crisis. when we talk about it to ukraine it is consisting of three parts. part of it is military and for the united states that is about half of the aid that we have provided. and then there is economic aid to the government and humanitarian aid of a wide sort, some going directly to ukrainians and some going to other countries affected by the war. the europeans and other global citizens have participated and helped all three kinds of aid. many countries prefer to provide humanitarian aid. it is nonlethal, it does not involve them in the conflict as directly. so the bottom line is that the european have spent a lot on humanitarian aid and some of which does not even appear in the numbers. the polls show that hundreds of

thousands of indian refugees and many of those show up in those state and local budgets, not in the aid packages. host: bill on the republican line in massachusetts. good morning. caller: how are you doing? there are a few questions. and a few follow-up things. we have treaties with france, great britain, and russia that when ukraine gave up their nuclear weapon and if they did and if they had any problem with anybody in the world or whatever that we would come to their aid anyway. and i have another question. the amount of money a missile takes to make but anyways, to

shoot down a drone or something a lot less money. i'm thinking a million-dollar's to 100,000 for the drone. do you think that is stupid. and also, one thing with the situation -- lord help me. host: you gave me enough to go on, but a start with those. guest: let me start with the drones first. and you will have to remind me of his first question. it says it does not make sense to use a million-dollar missile shoot down a drone and i would say no. and last that drone or cruise missile was going to hit a very sensitive area, a residential area or some very sensitive target than it might he worthwhile. but otherwise you'll end up on the wrong end of this economic exchange and remember the patriot missiles, the most

current one, that is $4 million. so you cannot shoot it at every drone that goes by and that is a severe limitation to the system which is why i say it can protect some of the country from some threats, but it will not protect whole country against all of the threats. you will have to remind me what the first question was. host: it was about the treaty about giving up soviet nuclear weapons. guest: and i believe this was called the bucharest agreement. and it was done in 1990 just like the caller said when ukraine gave up nuclear weapons russia, the u.s., u.k. agreed to guarantee ukrainian independence. but there was not an enforcement mechanism. in other words the requirement was that we consult, not that we defend ukraine and certainly it

is not like the nato treaty with article five. so, it did not require us to do that, and i think the ukrainians feel a bit betrayed and i can certainly understand why they feel that way. the plus side is that i think the united states government and the american people did not believe that they were taking on a security commitment when they signed the treaty. host: lawrence is next in texas. independent line. caller: good morning. my question is with all of this military equipment adding pumped into the ukraine. using contractors is a must in order to operate or maintain this equipment. is that going to put us in jeopardy with russia on having

americans on the ground in ukraine? guest: that is a very interesting question. i have long believed that we would need to send contractors ukraine to maintain the equipment. so far, i have not seen many references to american contractors being there. contractors would be very different from sending military. they are private decisions hired by companies. if there were to be or we were to take that path that would be some ukrainian company that hired americans to come in and maintain equipment. and the russians would complain and say that this is escalatory but it would not cross the redline. they are not troops. to be honest there are a lot of americans running around ukraine. many people who are over there for visits or a wide variety of

reasons so the idea of having americans in ukraine is not a big change. so far i have not seen that. the appear to be able to maintain equipment that they have been given. they have been trained on the equipment before it arrives and it also looks like they have set up very clever maintenance system whereby the ukrainians are connected in real time to maintainers back in the united states or europe, so if they are in the workshop and they have a problem, they have the camera and they look at the problem and someone in a remote station walks them through the procedure. and then for some systems that need a lot of work they put it on a railcar and send it to poland and it is fixed by contractors and military personnel and it seems like it is working and it is clever and quite resourceful. host: phil in florida.

democrat line. caller: hello. quick two questions. one, if i am an ally of the u.s. or united nations member, why is it that when it comes to aid you are unable -- unlimited in how i can get help either i give weapons to the ukraine but not get too deeply involved, why is that? second question, do we really think that ukraine can take on russia as a superpower? third question, and the final question, we are pumping so much money in ukraine and it is good to help i understand that. but when it comes to helping at home there seems to be a pushback when we are helping out the military folks when they come back. there is really a pushback. can you answer those. guest: ok. i'm going to start with the middle question which is can

ukraine take on russia and the answer is apparently yes. from early on most commentators thought that russia would prevail, and we can talk about the reasons why that was. but they did not. the ukrainians were clearly knocked on the back foot but they recovered and the flow of weapons was absolutely vital. it sustained ukrainian military capabilities and increase them. and they fought the russians to a standstill. the initiative now appears to be on the ukrainian side. so it is not impossible that the ukrainians will actually defeat the russians. on your question about dollars and the decisions about sending dollars ukraine versus at home and of course this is a topic that you hear a lot of among various groups on both the left

and the right. i mean personally, i get is worthwhile, supporting ukrainian democracy and resistance to the russians. i think u.s. security will be better off, all of us will be better off with the russians stalemated and ukrainians independent and democratic. having said that i recognize people's concerns about aid to the government. i said that there were three kinds of aid, economic aid to the government, humanitarian and military aid. aid to the government is where people have raised the most questions. we have a republican majority in the house that will start next month. i would not be surprised if they raise some questions. or held some hearings. i think they will stay pretty solid on humanitarian and military aid. so i say it is a fair question. i personally am in favor of it,

but i recognize that other people have raise some questions. host: tampa: floated -- tampa, florida on the republican line. good morning. guest: i have -- caller: i have a number of things i wanted to mention, the first essay i do not communism in this country and putin is not necessarily the nicest guy but nobody talks about the treaty that gorbachev negotiated way back when and that we have been poking the bear since the clintons and that there is really infighting in the ukraine between the russians that still live in the ukraine and are we just turning into arms dealers trying to make money from this war? i will hang up and let you respond. guest: ok. on the first question, this is a debate in the foreign policy

community and the question is this, this was in the bush 41 administration when we told the russians and the soviets when we would not move nato east. the russians took that as an absolute aaron t, that nato would not move to the east and it has and they argue that we have contravened our promises. the united states said we were only talking about east germany, not talking about broader europe and also the country that we made that agreement with, the soviet union, no longer exists. but it is debated. on your other question you will have to remind me what the other question was? host: we are running out of time so i want to get one more

question from sandy in north carolina. democrats line. caller: hello. host: hello sandy. caller: es. what i've -- yes i have been wondering about this guy just asked about the military-industrial complex which is making money on the weapons that they are developing and sending over. and also where is all the money going because it is not just our country but the other european countries are sending a lot of money over there. there is no way that country is using all of that money. so from what i have read there is a big money laundering scheme going on and the military complex is also making a bunch of money off of this. host: let us get a response. where is all of the money going? guest: there is this rumor about money laundering that money is coming back to the democratic party. that is not true. on the question about the

defense industry making money, it is true that there is about $20 million and up to $68 billion that the united states has committed and $20 billion will go to replace weapons or go to ukraine and that will benefit the defense industry. but you have to keep in mind that the annual defense. current -- procurement budget is 200 million. so this is a 10% increase so it is real but not a huge blip and it will only last for one or two years. i hear that this is being driven by profits. but that is a very small part of the aid packages. they humanitarian aid is mostly funneled through third parties. some of the ngo's, some of these other governments providing the aid and some of the those

directly to the ukrainian government. host: that is all the time we have for this segment. mark cancian, in your visor at -- senior advisor at csis, thank you for joining us. host: coming up it is our weekly spotlight on podcast segments, antony davies and james harrigan will be here to talk a big week in economic news on their podcast called "words & numbers." first it is open for them. can call in on any public policy or political stories on your mind. the numbers are on your screen. republicans, 202-748-8001. democrats, 202-748-8000. independents, 202-748-8002. we will be right back. ♪ >> there are a lot of places to

get political information but only at c-span do you get it straight from the source. no matter where you are from or where you stand on the issues, c-span is america's network. unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. if it happens here or anywhere that matters, america is watching on c-span. powered by cable. ♪ sunday night onq&a university of richmond journalism professor looks at the 1977 c of three buildings -- seige of three buildings in washington, d.c.. hostages were taken at the islamic center and the district holding. >> it is a story that has receded into the background and we do not talk a lot about it.

it has never been assembled by anybody in 15 years or 40 plus years. so a lot of it was lost and nobody has thought much about it . some of the federal -- records were retained but the local court records were lost. but i was driven to uncover that transcript and it is 1000 pages and it was everywhere would -- every word spoken by every witness which helped me on top of all of the other guy records and everything else. so that record really helped me piece together the record. >> sunday night at 8:00 eastern on q&a. you can listen to that and all of our podcasts on our free c-span now app. listening to programs on c-span c-span radio got easier. tell your smart speaker play

c-span radio and listen to washington journal daily at 7:00 a.m. eastern, important affairs events throughout the day and weekends at 5:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m. eastern, catch washington today. listen to c-span any time and just tell your smart speaker play c-span radio. >> washington journal continues. host: welcome back. it is open forum and i will be taking your calls and comments until about 9:15, and a couple of things i want to show you before i take the calls. it is an article from "the guardian" that says "elon musk reinstates twitter accounts of suspended journalists. on a wild day of bans and chaotic messaging musk abides by

the poll results that favored restoring the accounts of reporters that he accused of doxxing him and says that those accounts of several journalists had been banned a day earlier and after the second poll went against his preferred outcome. on thursday musk suspended a group of tech journalists including ryan mack from the new york times and donnie o'sullivan for what he said were breaches of the company's rule about revealing people's locations. after an initial poll supported an immediate reversal he said that there were too many options and ran another poll with just two options. to keep the ban in place for seven days or lifted immediately. after the close to -- after the close to 3.7 million votes users voted to lift the ban."

i thought that was interesting. also there is an exclusive hear from breitbart saying that " trump tax mccarthy for speaker and tells opponents to stand down. i think he deserves a shot." and this from january 6, this is "politico." "january 6 panel to vote to urge doj to prosecute trump on at least three criminal charges." they will have their final hearing coming up and we will have that for you on c-span and i will get those dates and times exactly for you shortly. let us go first to robert in was stair, massachusetts. democrats line. caller: good morning. i want to start out with january 6. this will be very exciting for

the american people to see what this committee had. they are going to explain from the beginning starting with donald trump. with his general mad dog and all of these characters. and then he had the police union. when people will talk about black lives matter, they said blue lives matter. and then we had characters in washington, senators and congressmen, like jim jordan and marjorie taylor greene and that kennedy from louisiana. did you ever hear that man speak? we had not had a baseball game in a long time since he got shot. ok. kevin mccarthy. host: and i do have that

information for you. you can watch the j 6 hearing and it will be on monday, you can watch live coverage getting at 1:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. you can watch on the freeobile video app, c-span now or c-span.org. that is on monday at 1:00 p.m. eastern. joe is next in missouri. republican. hello. caller: yes my comments is not about january 6 but i do not think the protesters did enough damage. but i am calling about the last guest. i do not want to give ukraine a penny. nothing. what we are trying to do is have a proxy war with our money and our weapons against russia and russia is not that tough if they cannot take the crab out of ukraine. they are not a superpower, they are a paper tiger.

i do not want to give them a penny. the american taxpayer is tired of fighting other people's war with our weapons and money. i do not want anything for them. they cannot defend themselves, tough. we do not owe them nothing. thank you. host: and here is the associated press about that conflict. "russia launches another major missile attack on ukraine and it says that the capital came under one of the biggest attacks on friday, yesterday, as russia's invading forces fired dozens of missiles across the country triggering widespread power outages. gunfire from air defense systems and explosions combined with the wail of air raid sirens as the barrage targeted critical infrastructure in cities including he have, -- kyiv, h

karkeiv and they intercepted missiles launched." in napa, california. davey, independent. caller: good morning. you know the guy before me just basically stole my thunder. i mean, what purpose does it serves america to be spending billions of dollars in this corrupt eastern european country that most americans could not point out on a map. it is a huge money laundering scheme. we did not sign up for a proxy war with russia. you have a bad man sitting over there with nuclear weapons capability is and it is like it is a football game the way that the news media reports on it and the way the politicians respond to eight and commit billions of dollars. which by the way that can build

millions of low income housing in the united states when we have people sleeping on the streets. by the way, we will invite another five or 10 million people that are poor and do not speak the language and/or a social drain on the taxpayer. there is only so much and it will only last so long. we are going to have upper writings -- uprisings. we are not stupid, we are distracted. that is what we are good at, distracting the public. but, eventually, people here will see the light and understand that the treasures are being looted. host: ellen in florida, democrat line. hello. caller: good morning. i am happy to share that i listen to c-span and i really enjoy it. one thing i wanted to talk about that is being -- that is not

being discussed about and they are talking about an increase in viruses and covid still reemerging but here in florida we have great policy which is no mandate. if you want to get a vaccination of any kind you can, they make them easily available. if you don't want to there are no repercussions even for school-age children and i think that should be the freedom that we have in the united states across the united states. host: here is "the new york times" saying that cold and flu season is among the worst on record. "after two difficult covid winters the current season of respiratory sickness already rivaled some of the worst cold and flu seasons on the record and it started about two months early. rsv has made so many young children ill this fall that

weekly pediatric hospitalizations are the highest on record. influenza which usually peaks and have february -- in february has risen for the first time in more than a decade surpassing hospitalizations from covid-19. and while illness is lower than the last two decembers it to his climbing. -- it to is climbing." l >> good morning. very christmas and happy holidays. happy hanukkah and everybody. i want to bring up something outside the box about the ftx. i want to say that the money was distributed by both parties. they are pointing fingers at each other. i like c-span a lot. there are tens of millions of

dollars that the company has given. they give them to democrats and republicans. the media bought into it because they were getting all kinds of money for all of the political campaigns. this is a major problem. we really have to focus. i will backtrack on some of the people that were talking before about the ukraine. we have to take care of our own people. we have a humanitarian crisis on the streets. it is crazy. we need affordable housing. everyone is preoccupied with the division in washington. mr. mcconnell has been in the senate for a long time, and you need to work with your democrat partners and help out the american people. god bless american. host: bernie and carlisle,

independent. caller: good morning too. i cannot member your name. host: mimi. caller: this might be a little off-topic, but two things. you had two people: recently. they've obviously forgotten their history regarding russia and ukraine. hiller was a demagogue and a dictator who started out small, taking over countries, and we ignored and with isolationist like those two gentlemen who called and don't want to send any more money or arms to ukraine. but more boringly, it points out something i've been saying for some time. the great domain down of america is almost complete. i'm wondering, and i don't think the answer this question, but i will give it a try. you folks who take the calls like this do a great job of not

responding to the caller, just listening and letting the caller rant or whatever. do you ever go into a conference room and say, can you believe how stupid some of these callers are? i'd like to suggest an idea for just a on scientific will. could you rate callers on a scale of one to three, one being relatively intelligent, to being somewhat intelligent, and three being dumber than a rock. someday, report on all of us listeners of how many are qualified, and we can break it apart as a democrat, independent, and republican, and just see how who wins of the dumb scale. >> i appreciate the input and suggestion. let's go to mary in

philadelphia. hello. caller: good morning. i was thinking that your callers are not aware that the government is only enforcement and regulatory authorities for the country. i work for the government for 45 years, in the state of pennsylvania. we have every red flag law on the book. on everybody. even if you take out $10,000 from your bank, that information goes to the treasury department. every regulation is monitored. by the state, by the federal government. we know who is in the country. my problem is, we are not doing

a good job of regulating enforcement in this country. we have people who come to this country illegally. we know who they are. they hire by businesses and corporations, to avoid paying taxes. we know who they are. but we have no one from our government that is willing to go up against high-profile businesses, corporations, politicians, even with our war on poverty. war on terror. that is also regulated. now, we provided all of this money for our military. we did not collect one tax in the ukraine war, and also in afghanistan.

we have to start collecting taxes from these independent contractors that are primarily handling these wars in his country. we have to collect taxes from people, nonprofits that are handling immigration in this country. we are only the legal part of this, so all of these agencies do their job. ftx should have never happened because it should have been monitored by our security exchange commission. host: let's go to walter and butler indiana, republican. caller: thank you for taking my call, and through a lot of people that are very round -- wound up in the world. they are wound up and worried about things they can't control, and i will pass a probe.

maybe one person will take it, but if no one knows how. i've never had a cell phone. i've never been on a computer. i never tweet or tiktok or chitchat or dingdong. i never do anything but write letters up with them and mail. i have nice music and i have a tv here, and i read a lot of books, and i've learned in life that this is my message. take your cell phones and your computers and shut them off. throw them away. go back to communicating. go back to making eye contact with people, and i've been a productive citizen, and i worked my whole life and serve in the military, i voted every four years, and i've done what i can, but everyone is so wound up about things they cannot change. if you can't change it, it doesn't concern you. cut your grass and love your family. be a good neighbor or representation of what you are in life it be a father and a friend.

let things go. no one makes eye contact anymore. they go to restaurants with children and they pass out these little pods and stare at pods all morning. they don't even talk. if you go to make a conversation, they don't know how to do it. everyone should take a breath. we are blessed to get up in the morning and have fresh water and food. control what you can control. i hope that hits home with somebody, and god bless everyone. thank you for taking my call. >> thank you for the advice. bernie of pennsylvania, independent. >> yes. i want to make this clear. the reason why we are in the ukraine, the reason why we fought in the middle east, the reason why we have laboratories all over the place, the reason why the pandemic treaty is being put together, in february, the reason why people are moving

towards green energy, climate change, all of that, this is all under a package for a new world order to be rolled out, and guess who is paying for all these packages? taxpayers. they have a right to complain about where the money is going. the money is ukraine. i've been reading articles. they cannot account for the arms we ship. they are afraid it will go on the black market. somebody's making a killing over there, but the american taxpayer is paying for the new world order rollout. that's what it's about. we are paying for this global system that will take over our lives and we are going to lose our freedoms. thank you. host: that was bernie. john is in nashville, tennessee. good morning. caller: thank you for c-span.

i want to say to your callers, united states, we are like the police of the world. if we don't do it, than who you have left? china? come on. you have to have us. we are the police of the world and that's all there is to it. that's what we did in world war ii. that's what were doing now. all these people talk about money going there to the ukraine. that is not going to ukraine. the equipment is going to ukraine. humanitarian services are going to ukraine. money is not you going -- not going to ukraine. no money is going to ukraine. it's the equipment. all of these people calling in, not knowing what the hell they are talking about. host: equipment costs money. caller: that's what were here for. to protect us to make sure it doesn't come over here to america. we are there to save us. if we have ukraine, that's what

we have to do. just like africa. we do the same thing. you don't hear about that, but we are doing it. we have to do it. that is our job. people don't like it, get the hell out of our country. host: all right. here is a tax from marcy in kansas who says we have a madman with nuclear power trying to take over ukraine. all of the reason not to embolden him, and the pit in the bud. the history says not to give him such a path. we can pay with dollars now or lives of our finest later. take care of our future now. money comes future than our sons and daughters lives. joyce is next. she is in flint michigan. hello. caller: thank you for taking my call. i want to say that i am not opposed to sending money to

ukraine, but we need to have accountability. where does the money go. i hope c-span will have the money on who can tell us where money is going because it seems quite often we are hearing of 30 billion going to this or that, so just rake it down. we have serious issues here. we have homelessness, crime we have a lot of young students who would like to attend the issues at the border. we should take care of home first. we should make other countries pay their fair share, but c-span, i am asking you to have someone on who will give us an accountability, a breakdown of where this money is going. thank you for your program, and thank you for your time. gary is in mechanicsburg. democrat. >> is that me? >> yes. >> that's me.

thank you. after i listen to bernie from ohio, i was like, everything he says was right on. it is amazing how you are listening to everyone, and the dumbing down of america, and since i am home a lot, i try to catch up on my civics and my knowledge of history, and make america first, the same conversations we are having when we talk about getting into world war ii, there were a lot of americans. they said no, stay out of it, and now we are looking back saying it's a good thing we did. hiller was not going to stop. putin is not going to stop. we're not fighting to help ukraine, we are fighting democracy. if he takes over ukraine, you will go to other countries, and he could come after us. thank you. the woman who called in about

ukraine, i am all for supporting ukraine, but i totally believe in checks and balances. i want to know where the money is going. so many other wars. we have found out there's so much waste. yes. totally, for that, another very interesting thing. i've discovered on youtube that i've been following a young russian girl her name is victoria and i cannot pronounce last name. but i accidentally found her, and she is talking about what it is like living in russia, and she talks about when her and her husband in china -- child left russia, and last night, i strongly recommend, i wish i could spell her last name, but there was a conversation she had with her father who is living in russia, but is doing humanitarian aid to mariupol.

it is so interesting, listening to someone who is actually living with this experience. host: i am going to get one more call in. jaden in north carolina. independent line. caller: good morning. i wonder why c-span, no new stations. i think the biggest threat to democracy is right now, these far-right groups, trying to overthrow the government. one just happened in germany, they stop it before it started. we could have learned a lot from them, but it seems like it is too embarrassing and they don't want to tell or let people know the truth of what is going on. nobody cover that story. i can't believe it. the last thing i want to say is that we spend a lot of money overseas. $80 billion we have spent over here in ukraine.

we've got a border crisis that everyone is complaining about. if we were to spend $5 billion on the countries right here in our backyard, we wouldn't have this problem. i don't understand this. last thing c-span, trump is trying to get reelected, and we know what he did. we should be fearful because israel is just electing a netanyahu or whatever his name is, and he's a corrupt person. he managed to get back in to rule israel. this seemed like the same thing could happen over here. we need to look at these things. these are the things that will really affect our democracy. host: we're out of time. up next, it is our weekly spotlight on podcast segments. economist anthony davies and clinical scientist james harrigan will be here to talk

about economic news and the podcast, words and numbers. we will be right back. ♪

are you a nonfiction book lover looking for a new podcast? on q&a you will listen to interesting interviews with people and authors writing books on history and subjects that matter. learn something new on footnotes plus. afterwards brings together best-selling nonfiction authors for hours long conversations. on about books we talk about the business of books. find all of our podcasts by downloading the free c-span now at or wherever you get your podcasts. >> sunday night on q&a a

journalism professor looks at the 1977 siege of three buildings. hostages were taken at all three locations. >> it's amazing how the story has receded in the background and we don't talk about it as much. it's the first time anyone has ever told the story, it's never been assembled in 50 years. a lot of it was lost and nobody has thought, some of the records were retained but a lot of the court records were lost including the transcript. the transcript is thousands of pages and it was every word spoken by every witness during the trial which really helped me. that record really helped me

piece together the secrets -- sequence of events. >> you can listen to q&a and all of our podcasts on the free c-span now app. >> washington journal continues. it is our weekly spotlight on podcast. it is called words and numbers. i am joined by anthony davies. he is a milton friedman distinguished fellow in the foundation for economic education, and the jame harris can senior editor for the american institute for economic research. gentlemen, welcome. nice to have you. >> good morning. just as a reminder to her listeners, if you would like to call in or make a comment or ask a question, feel free. you can call in now. the lines are by party affiliation.

democrats on the screen, and independence on the screen. let me start with you. tell me about the podcast. what does it focus on? >> it is a look at current events to the eyes of an economist or a political scientist. we take the nonpartisan view of the world that is not to say we don't have strong opinions, but we will call to task democrats and republicans equally when we think they have gone wrong. >> tell me about the format. who do you talk to. how often do you do this podcast? >> episodes come out weekly. on wednesdays. they are a half-hour, give or take, based on what is going on. i was say two thirds of the episodes are james and i talking about something. one third of the episodes will have caps on. we have guest such as phil gramm, lincoln chafee, vernon smith, the low bout -- no value

-- nobel laureate. but generally speaking, we take our tonic of interest to the day to non-expert intelligent people. >> i want to ask about the target audience. we say non-experts, who are you trying to reach, and what you want people to know? guest: we are trying to reach everyone. that is hard when you talk about an online process that you rarely come in contact with anyone in the real world. we think about that quite a lot. it turns out that we have the best format were ever going to get. i will pick up where anthony left off. we -- the last part -- we have a big section right before the main, and we took a look at quick hits versus two ridiculous new stories, and a third that is specifically newsworthy and stupid.

we run with those. we notice something. before we had a framing on the podcast that we can look and say here, we were not nearly as disciplined. it was much harder. it made our lives easier over the years. host: your most recent podcast episode was called how did we get here. it touched on a lot of the recent economic issues of the day. one of them is government spending. we are seeing congress expected to finish the on an abyss -- omnibus bill that is 1.7 join dollars. let's talk about that. guest: it's not surprising. there is nothing energy -- there is not anything surprising that it is higher that it is. we have reached a point in our country with little steps over the past 100 years to the point where voters want free stuff,

and i will take whatever the government can give me so long as someone else is paying for it, and if we all have the attitude, we end up where we are, which is a burgeoning federal debt, you got to a point where you have borrowed so much money that you run out of places to borrow more. we print money, and that gives us inflation, so we go to the gas pump, and we complain about the price of gas, but what we are really paying for is all of those stimulus checks that come out back in the age of covid. plus all of the deficits we have been running for the past half-century. >> want to ask you about the current debt ceiling limit because we are expected to reach that sometime next year. what are they cash why do we have a debt ceiling, and what are the issues with raising a? >> i like to refer to it. it is not a ceiling so much as a low hanging mist. congress can raise the debt

ceiling any time it would like, it is raising it about every six months. so, what ends up being is not so much a ceiling on the debt as an opportunity for the politicians to get in front of the media and to say things like they are fighting for you, whether you are interested in holding the debt constant or you are interested in blowing through it and having more spending. it is an opportunity for politicians to get from the media rather than being any real economic structure on the federal government. >> what you expect with republican-controlled house? you think spending will go down or will the topline go down or up? what do you expect? >> you should expect more of the same. , grass and the republicans link with each other. they are both on the same team at this point.

they have -- progressives have slightly different talking points, but when we get down to it, there is no way to say our government will function through this. if you really want to talk about parties, i think it is going to be an ugly conversation. host: let's go to a conversation on twitter. in new jersey, we are being asked what the tax cut from trump have done for the u.s. economy? guest: the short answer is not much. the reason is not much is that any given president's policies only hit the economy around the edges. the economy has an inertia to it that is built up over the course of decades of many presidents, many congresses, on both sides of the aisle, and to move that is like trying to move a battleship plowing through the model. there's not much a single person can do. host: i will remind her of yours

that you can call in and ask questions or make a comment. the lines are republican, democrat, and independent. let's take a call from jim who is calling from winter park florida. hello. caller: good morning. i would like to know the feelings about the currency, the ftx debacle that is going on. the cryptocurrency. what is getting me is this is still in money. this is money that was stolen from people who invested in ftx. the senators and congressmen and stuff are going i will donate this money that i've got from sam bankman-fried for this charity or that. if you steal a bank, they give you the money back to that is a bank should go back to investors of ftx. i like to know their opinion on

this. thank you. guest: as for ftx, i'm right in the same room with you. these people committed a terrible crime. they are going to have to be accountable at some point. whether they can make their clients whole, i really doubt it. broadly speaking on crypto, it has a place, and is not going a -- away anytime soon, but when you crawl into the details and take a good look at how it works, you walk away with the knowing that there will be some risk, and it might be significant, but i wish i had bought bitcoin before, but i didn't. so it goes. host: do you have a? -- do you have a comment on that? guest: ftx's financial fraud.

they happen to use cryptocurrency and going about it, but i am concerned that cryptocurrency gets tainted by this. cryptocurrency at the moment is just a toy. i think long-term, it will serve a purpose. we just don't know how to use this correctly. i would not surprised that 30 or 40 years from now, it becomes a de facto global currency. host: you said something interesting on your podcast. you said we will get to a point where we cannot a back what we borrowed or the interest. explain that. guest: the official debt is $30 trillion, but then you can add onto that what is called unfunded liabilities. this is money that has been promised to current and future retirees for social security benefits, and it is unclear how much the unfunded liabilities are. the estimates range from 100 to

$300 trillion. even if you take the low end of that, we are in a space where if you devote 100% of the tax revenue towards paying what you owe on the debt and what you owe on the unfunded liabilities, we would be able to pay at all, so the long and short of it is, what that means, we will reach a place where we run into the laws of mathematics. we simply cannot do the things we've been doing. what that looks like, i don't know, but the budget office itself has estimated that we are going to have to cut benefits but joint percent, or increase them by 20% or a combination. some point in the next 10 years. host: let's talk to daniel. good morning. caller: good morning morning. i have a question for both of your hosts. both of your people especially.

in the united states, we are turning 82 -- into a country that is anti-oil and anti-gas. we have enough money in the ground to pay off our national debt. we can produce oil and gas. but we have decided to follow a hoax. it is perpetrated, i believe, by russia, iran, and saudi arabia. and opec. they are extracting wealth out of our country. the american people continue to borrow against them produce nothing. host: let's get a response. go ahead. caller: first, when we purchase

oil or anything else from a foreign country, we have a tendency to look at that as somehow costing us because dollars are going out of the country to pay for things we could otherwise produce ourselves, and we are missing half of the picture. the other half is what our reporters doing with those dollars. they buy things that we produce. we are not producing oil. we are buying it from foreign countries, but instead we are producing semiconductors and machine parts. we are selling them to foreign countries. it is not a matter of losing out. rather, it is a shifting of our productive capacity away from one thing to another. host: daniel says we have enough in the ground to pay off this debt. is that true? guest: i don't know the numbers, but you have to be careful about taking how much oil we estimate is in the ground, and multiplied

by the price of oil. that equals 30 between dollars. we are missing several things. it costs something, and if we want to pull all of that oil and dump it on the market, the price of oil would drop your a bit asleep. all of you don't have $30 trillion. you have less. the key is not about pulling oil out of the ground for it is about restraining the government. that is the source of the problem. politicians have been spending more money than we have. host: buffalo on the democrats line. tom. good morning. caller: my question is the tax breaks for the rich. how does it help the rich? i'll take the answer off of the phone. host: who would like to take that? guest: go ahead. it might well be the case that progressives, people at the top of the food chain, politically,

it is perfectly possible for them to suffer but nonetheless, having a system work. it doesn't guarantee an outcome. it guarantees a fair and just population. guest: one of the things we keep in mind is we've constructed a tax code that is highly progressive at the federal level, we've done it for good reason. we want the rich to pay more and we want to be able to help the poor, but when you have a highly progressive tax code like that, virtually any tax cut is a tax cut for the rich because that is principally the only people who are paying. host: we have a question from philip in mackinaw city, michigan. he asks, with all the money being spent, we are seeing inflation being reflected in the rising stock market. their ideas about spending supplies.

guest: what is interesting is over the decades, politicians have pointed to john maynard keyes who says when we are spending, we need to spend more, so that in recession, here is an economist who says we should spend more. what they don't do in the politicians on both sides, what they don't do is quote the next sentence. the next sentences, when the economy is expanding, you need to cut back on government spending. somehow, they don't like the quote that part. what happens is you get to this place where we been ratcheting up government spending every time we go into a recession. we will spend more and go into expansion and don't come back. we get a burgeoning federal budget that we have, you end up in the space where you have to print money, this is what we did during covid. you print money to pay for the $6 trillion of spending, and much of the money goes into financial markets, driving up stock prices.

you saw the right stock markets, and we said great. prices are going up. we look at inflation see what is happening but we print them play should marry money and we don't get it. when things settle down, people take the money and they move into goods and services. that is when we saw inflation. that is what we are experiencing now. it comes down the road 18 months after the fact, and we are feeling the echo in inflation of that money printing from covid. guest: oops. host: it looks like we lost our links to james, but we are happy to have you. what do you think of the gold standard versus the cs currency we have now? guest: i am in favor of a gold standard. here's why. there's nothing magical about gold.

people say gold has value and should have a gold standard. that's not it. what makes a gold standard valuable is that there's only so much gold out there. it's is only so much gold out there, your paper dollars are tied to the gold. you can only have so many paper dollars. that is restricting the number of dollars that is important, whether you do that by tying to a gold standard or tying to a land standard or freshwater or writing into law. there will not be more than so many dollars in circulation. that is what you need. to control the number of dollars in circulation. if you want to control or prevent all of what we have now, which is printing money to pay for what it was. host: let's go to washington. good morning zach. caller: i had a question about the future of income for the average american citizen. there is a lot of concern about the younger generation changing job patterns and having to have

two or three different jobs because your older jobs are becoming obsolete. i wonder about the universal basic income and the --. host: we had a bad connection to zach. caller: us talk about universal basic income because that is something i am for with a large footnote. the large footnote is this. i think we would be better off in this country with a universal basic income that replaced everything we do to help the poor. have the basic income, but get rid of everything from housing subsidies to minimum wage to unemployment insurance print all of it. get rid of all of it and replace it with a sick income. that is a better solution than what we have now for all sorts of reasons, but i am hesitant. politicians are unlikely to do

that. what they are likely to do is put basic income on top of everything we are doing. that is worse, we have now. caller: scott is next. caller: good morning. i appreciate the program this morning. why does our federal government not work with in a balanced budget. household suet. states to it. why can they not do it. i will listen to the response. thank you. guest: the simple reason is because nobody actually wants that. we all say we want a balanced budget, but the fact is, when it comes down to it, if the government offers me something i want, for something i want for free, i will say, yes, so long as someone else pays for it, but every one of the 300 million of us are saying that, and what you get is a situation where we are all electing to office politicians who promise to give

us someone else paying for, and before you know, that is the entirety of congress. they are looking to spend more, and they will make noise about restricting their spending, but it doesn't happen. we can trace all of this back to the 1920's where we as a society decided that article one section eight of the constitutional longer apply. that is a section of the constitution that laid out what the federal government was allowed to do. if you read that, they're eight or nine things there. that is it. we said we want the federal government to do more. there were good reasons that we said that, but what comes from that is what we have now. a federal government that is in effect having no limits. host: a question via text. to what degree is the labor shortage contributing to inflation? guest: the labor shortage is not contributing to inflation. inflation, generally speaking,

occurs when your money supply grows faster than your production of goods and services. you have more and more dollars chasing the same number of good and services. what is happening with labor is kind of interesting. on the one hand, a bunch of people dropped out of the labor force because of covid. they discovered that they liked not working. they were close to retirement. they decide not to go back, or maybe it was a two income household and they discovered they can do with one income, so some of it is that. there's another interesting thing we are trying to get her heads around, that is a gig economy. one third of workers say they have a fixed income on the side. maybe from airbnb or doing some crafts that they sell or whatever it is. one third of workers have income on the side through a gig economy, and one third of those say it is their major source of income. we have tremendous number of workers, and here's the problem.

we have not figured out how to count them yet. they are not employees. they don't show up in business numbers. they aren't small businesses, or at least most of them haven't register as a small business, so they are not showing up on irs schedule sees, and in effect, there is no paperwork such that we can count them as being employed. host: dave and virginia, independent line. caller: good morning. host: how are you? caller: i'm doing well. thank you for taking my call. are there any current politicians that have a viable plan to contact spending and do something about the debt? it seems like every politician gets up there, and the solution everything is to throw more money at it. are there any programs that have been going for the last 20 years that can be looked at to discontinue this.

that is my question. guest: the short answer is no. might be one or two, but the short answer is no. here's why. if you give me to politicians who are identical in every way, except for one, this guy's primary goal is to seek the common good and do what is right and best for society. this guy's primary goal is to win elections. on average, this guy is going to win. the politician who is going to win is a politician's primary goal is to win elections. how do we win elections? i have to appeal to the, and i have to do it with a 10 second soundbite. what can i do in a 10 second soundbite. elect me and i will give you free tuition. what can i not do? explain why that is a very bad idea. host: what's talk to avon columbia, mississippi. republican. caller: i want to know on the

news recently, aoc, they were talking about her having gotten free tickets. did she have to count that his income, and does joe biden have to count when he stays in these 21 million dollar mansions? how does he count that if the taxpayer has to pay for it? too they just go to his own home for the holidays? guest: there are rules about this. there are rules that i don't of the particulars about, but they exist. all editions and elected officials receiving things. they are all sorts of minuscule rules over certain amounts that you have to count if it is a meal or if you're sitting down. you have to count if you are standing up, it believe it or not. they're all kinds of things in place, so the short answer is yes. they counted, but the things they don't count tend to be small items we wouldn't care about anyways. host: here's a comment from pennsylvania. it is not complicated. the government needs to be transparent with means.

it is no different than what responsible people do. they spend money rightly and efficiently. go ahead. guest: that is absently right. what hurts me to the core is you can find people on the left and people on the right who agree with that. we tend not to see that we agree with each other because politicians, both democrats and republicans have an incentive to keep us fighting each other. so long as we keep fighting against each other, convincing each other on the left or right that they are evil, or convince the people they are stupid, or whatever, so long as we are at each other's throats, we fight each other, and we never come to a conclusion that our listeners coming to. this is a very smart thing, we all agree on it. we might disagree on details on the edges, but in general, we agree with the direction the country should take, but we

never get that point because we are fighting. politicians like that. host: then in north carolina says we no longer abide by the constitution. how does the government justify expansion since it is outside of the enumerated powers. what laws do they reference. >> are all sorts of gymnastics the supreme court has done over the years, and if you study constitutional law, 101, it starts to go through these things. all sorts of things that key the poster child of a decision back in the 1940's or 50's. a man growing to defeat cows, and the government comes into say can only grow so much corn, the argument is the constitution allows the federal government to say that it why? because, this is what the supreme court says, by growing this corn and beating your cows, you are buying corn on the market. if you are buying corn market,

some of the corn you are not buying may have come from across state lines, and that is interstate commerce. by the interstate commerce clause, we are authorized to regulate you feeding your cows. it is gymnastics like that that the supreme court has done over many decades that has led us to where we are. host: reminding people that we will continue to take your calls for 15 minutes until the end of the program. the number is on your screen. anthony, a tweet from james. we will say this. a perfect financial formula. the tax rate on the wealthy from 1940 to 1980, or double or triple today's rates. reagan slashed rates, that's when we have so much debt. what do you think? guest: yes. one of the things we get wrong about tax rates is how much people are actually paying. we like to say this thing about

the rich bank a fair share, but oddly, no one says what fair is, so it is unclear if they are paying their fair share, but if we look at what they are actually paying, the numbers i'm about to quote you come from a congressional budget office. if you look at all of the taxes paid to the federal government, so income taxes, payroll taxes, tariffs, the whole thing. everything you pay as a fraction of your entire income from all sources, wages, capital gains, inheritance, whatever. if you look at the total federal taxes divided by your total income, we can ask how much you actually are paying. when the dust settles and you've done your accounting and legal gymnastics and write offs and deductions, what are you actually paying. if we ask that, what we find is the top 1% pay about 30% to 32%. middle income americans pay 11%. the poor pay 5%. what we have ignored is in the

entire conversation, transfers. transfers are the opposite of taxes. the government takes money off the table and gives you money. it accounts for transfers, and what we find is the top 1% pay 32%. middle income americans pay about -5%. they get back from the federal government more than they pay in. the poor pay -125%. the business about the rich not paying enough lies in the face of numbers. we could argue they should pay more still, and i'm willing to entertain the argument, but we first have to start with what they actually are paying now. host: let's go to bob in louisville, kentucky, republican. caller: good morning. interesting conversation with we talk about ubi, ukraine, elections, it all boils down to dollars. one of you guys talked about $30

trillion in debt, and i have deep concerns. i talked to people about this, nobody really understands what that means. we really don't have a lot of contacts in the conversation. i am a simplistic person. if i want to say how many dollars each taxpayer owes, i google it. there are about a hundred 50 million individual income tax returns filed in this country. my iphone is doing the math correctly. that's about $200,000. we have young people who think $30,000 in student debt is bad. i'm not sure people in their 20's or 30's understand each one of those carrying $200,000 in federal debt. that is being an individual taxpayer. we run out of money, it's like it's right here. interest rates are heading up to 5%. $200,000 with 5% is $10,000 per year. it's going to be an interest on every american debt. $10,000 per year.

each of the hundred 50 million taxpayers, we don't put the right context on this. nobody had talk with understands this. how much debt there is. guest: that's right, but there's a footnote we have to keep in mind. we don't need to pay off debt. there's 30 trillion, and how we going to pay that back? we going to pay it off. it's like a credit card. you can roll it over so long as you can make the minimum monthly payment. in the federal government spaeth, the minimum payment is on debt. as pointed out correctly, as interest rates start to rise, we get into this very strange space. all of a sudden, our interest on the debt, the federal debt, it has to be paid every year. this starts to get very high. in fact, with $30 trillion in debt, a 1% increase rate, just one, because the federal government and additional $300 billion a year.

now, we have a weird situation where the federal reserve is stuck between a rock and a hard place. on the one hand, we need to raise interest rates to fight inflation. but as we raise interest rates, the interest on the debt now goes up in the federal government has to do more. we have paid -- painted into a corner where you have to choose between doing what is good for the voters, with low inflation, and doing what is good for the federal government. that low interest payments. >> want to show everyone really quickly, this is the u.s. debt clock, you can see the national debt on your screen. 31 trillion. this is what we were talking about. the debt occurred -- per citizen and the taxpayer. it is coming close to $250,000 on this site, you can see the income, so this is revenue.

federal, state, local revenue. let's go to brian. north dakota, democrat. good morning. >> the morning. i had a quick question. i don't know if it is a dumb question, but i know there are no dumb questions. i'm curious how it works when you say there are $50 billion in ukraine, and all of the other wars that we've been sending money to all these different countries and they ever responsible to pay that money back, and if so, have they, and how does that affect our debt and how we owe other countries money because you could explain that too. >> one of the things to keep your mind is that $150 billion sounds like a lot. but the government blows through $50 billion over the course of a matter of hours on a regular basis. in the great scheme of federal spending, it is just change.

not even change create is a fraction of a penny, but nonetheless, it is $50 billion, and your russian is what happens here? one of the things we have to keep in mind is often, not always come but often, investing in ukraine, we will send $50 billion to help them. it comes back later to us dressed up not as repayments of the loan, but as a staple country. as a ally, even. that can be worth more to us in terms of dollars on the road then paying back $50 billion. host: we have a question from debbie in new mexico. could you ask your guests to explain this memo because it seems to be what they are pushing. you know that is? guest: i don't know what that is. host: let's go to michael in plainfield illinois. independent line.

caller: i'm going to be critical of your guests. i don't know what school economics he came from, but all of life is redistributed. the clouds, rain, crops are grown and people harvest that, and we plow it back into the system. we go around and around. high taxes are absolutely needed and necessary to a functioning and viable economy. this is the problem of the u.s.. you haven't mentioned anything about this. you're always, americans want the stuff for free. look. the rich steal all of their money. they bought up the politicians

and the entire defense network is just sitting there protecting various assets. what we need is massive increases on taxes for the rich. then, we will have a vibrant economy. when i was still working, just starting out, i had a good job. i was making ready $8,000 a year which was the equivalent of about 200 or 250 now. we had 70% taxes on the bank i worked for and you know what they gave big raises because they didn't want to give the money to the federal government. you talk about cuts, but i say no. let's tax, and if we can't pay for this, we cut it. host: let's get an answer. guest: this is a place where we can bring people on the right and left together.

we can recognize that we are a society. we have in front of us to tools. one is government and the other is markets. the key to becoming a vibrant society is knowing when to use the right tools for the right problem. what we have a tendency to do is to invoke government as a tool every time. so we see a problem and we run to washington so you have to do something about this. there are problems in which the government is the right tool, and you actually need taxes. it applies the government to whatever the problem is that you want to deal with. but it is not always the right tool, when you apply government in places where it should be applied, we raise taxes, and we have the government do whatever it is doing, but when you raise those taxes, what we are necessarily doing is squelching the market. we can have more of this thing. like education.

if her going to tax people and pay for higher education, will get more higher education. absolutely. but we are necessarily going to get less of other things. we will get less computers, houses, things like this. so the question is, is that a decent trade-off? we tend not to think of the trade-off. we only think in terms of more of this thing. rather than asking, what do we get to get that thing. host: lagrange illinois, independent. can you be brief? caller: yes. i am just wondering. we gave out a trillion dollars which i'm assuming we shouldn't have done. you're thinking we should have done that. it is inflationary. did we not first at $5 trillion to the bank to make sure this system? i hear you talk about the one trillion, but i never hear about

the 5 trillion thick went to the bank first. we have to prime the pump. we never stop priming the pump since 2008. we say we are going to lower rates, but we never brought them up. we have low rates for a long time and that crazy bubble. we knew this. they knew this. everyone knew this. but if we are making money, we will make another five or 10%. let's go to 10 or 12 years. correct? guest: i have to underline something you said. i am against the government handing out money. it doesn't matter who the recipient's. i am concerned about handing it out to corporations and when we deal with covid, i think we are faced with how to pick the lesser of evils. the government came in and worked all -- for various reason shut down the economy.

the right answer would've been not to shut down the economy. but with covid on the other side, we were uncertain with the deaths, so given our proven understanding of the time, we said we need to shut down the economy. what comes next? what comes next is we have to keep people -- people to eat. they have to keep working to the extent they are. what we have to do is print a bunch of money and handed out. i don't think it is a good thing to do, but i do think it will be the best thing we could have done under the situation. what we could have done to present that situation in the first >> i think one of the things we have to be careful of is distinguishing between government acting and emergencies. and acting simple because we want something. covid was on emergency a lot

like world war ii was. no one was arguing we should not be spending for world war ii. there are lots of other times where we point to something and say we really want to get this thing but it is not an emergency and that is not the time to be printing money. host: thank you so much for being on the program. >> my pleasure. thank you. host: on monday the january 6 committee holdsts final public hearing on the attack of the u.s. cap watch live covgiing at 1:00 live eastern on c-span. that is all the time we have for today. the "washington journal" will be back tomorrow. in the meantime, have a great saturday. ♪