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journal" for february 16. a $19 trillion rise in u.s. debt by 2033. the difference between what the government spends and receives will reach $1.5 trillion this year. this calls into question the financial stability of social security and medicare. what federal programs should receive money and which should be cut. here is how you can call and let us know. (202)-748-8001 for republicans -- (202)-748-8000 for republicans, (202)-748-8001 for democrats, (202)-748-8002 for independents. you can also text us at (202)-748-8003 and post on facebook and twitter. you can also follow the show on instagram. the new york times offers analysis of the comments which

you can see on c-span. it talked about adding of that $19 trillion to the national debt over the next decade, $3 trillion more than forecast. when it comes to that gap between what the government spends and what it takes from revenues, it says over the next 10 years those deficits will average $2 trillion. it also says the debt held by the public will equal the total annual output of the u.s. economy in 2024, rising 118% by 2033. you can find that on c-span but here is the overview of what they found when it came to the u.s. fiscal position. [video clip] >> in the latest projections

released today the budget deficit average $2 trillion over 2024 to 2033. that is about federal spending general remaining unchanged. the deficit grows to 9.5% of gdp in 2033. that is larger than the 3.6% that deficits have averaged over the last 50 years. here on the screen you can see those deficit figures. the cumulative deficit over the 2023 to 2032 period is $3 trillion larger than last may because of newly enacted legislation and changes to the economic forecast that boost spending on mandatory programs.

the federal debt held by the public is projected to rise from 98% of gdp in 2023 to 118% in 2033. that is an average increase of two percentage points per year. the growth of interest costs and mandatory spending outpaces the growth of revenue and the economy, driving up debt. those persist beyond 2033 pushing federal debt hired to 195% in 2053. turning to outweighs, the increase in mandatory spending is driven by rising costs for social security and medicare. total discretionary spending falls in relation to gdp. as the cost of financing the nation's debt grows, net outweighs for interest grows substantially.

this shows revenues. after reaching a historic high in 2022 receipts from individual income taxes are projected to fall in 2023 because collections on capital gains and other sources, which has been strong in recent years, fall in our projections. this because of the scheduled expiration of the 2017 tax act. host: that is what to expect when it comes to the economy from the congressional budget office over the next 10 years plus. there is other information as well available on our website or c-span now. you heard him talk about the programs that could be impacted by the u.s. fiscal condition. that is what we are asking you. what programs should see more money invested and which should be cut? (202)-748-8001 for republicans, (202)-748-8000 for democrats, and independent (202)-748-8002.

in light of yesterday a couple of headlines to show you with programs in mind, at least what congress may consider doing about them. this is from fox news. the house and the senate republicans in a battle over possible defense cuts in an effort to curb spending. as you heard, social security set to run short one year earlier than expected. he expanded on the state of social security and what might happen to that program because of fiscal estimates. here is some of that from yesterday. [video clip] >> maybe this is the answer for the medicare, social security report but to the numbers give any indication of the solvency dates? >> it does. that is one thing we have today.

the news is that the social security solvency date is within the budget window. it has moved up to 2032 and that is reflecting the main driver of the change of the financial status of social security. of course, there is high inflation and high nominal wage growth that improves the solvency of the system. unmet it led to a deterioration in the system and that moves our exhaustion date forward one year but into the budget window. to figure out the importance of what that means, that means in 2032, with no change in the law,

beneficiaries would see a reduction of more than 20%. they are promised but not payable after the exhaustion of the trust fund date. doing nothing means benefits will go down for all beneficiaries by more than 20%. host: he talked about social security. that might be on your list of programs that should be boosted or cut. call us on the lines that best represent you. you can text us at (202)-748-8003 and you can post on our social media. reaction from members of congress yesterday on the budget and debt issues. this is the fed jority leader chuck schumer on his twitter, chaos in the house on the republican side. each day gets closer to default. that would hurt americans badly but no closer to a republican plan to lift the debt ceiling. house republicans speaker mccarthy, show is your plan.

representative richard neal saying, while the president introduced the budget that would decrease the national deficit by $2 trillion over the next 10 years, republicans are supporting adding $3 trillion to the deficit. extending the trump tax cuts and repealing reforms to lower drug prices also saying the republican playbook would hand out money to the megarich. can the speaker of the house on his twitter -- kevin mccarthy on his twitter yesterday, a blank check will destroy our country. that is why we must negotiate a responsible debt limit and get our fiscal house back in order. senator mitt romney, it is outrageous and immoral to ignore our burgeoning national debt. we leave our children and grandchildren saddled with the consequences.

we have an obligation to get our spending under control now. representative kevin hern saying, there is no better time to address our nation's finances when the bill comes due. that is what reaching the debt limit represents. the american people, who must balance their own budgets, understands this. factor those into your discussions or what you would like to see boosted or cut. mike in maryland, democrat, you are first. caller: one thing about this argument is it appears to me on the surface to be more hypocritical than anything. i say it for this reason. the country as a whole needs to come together. that part is true. what is so bad about it is on the republican side, where the voters really want no mention of

anything related to budget or spending was said by the trump administration. they were scared yellow to say anything about budget cuts in the face of dealing with trump. all of a sudden the democrats are running the country into the hole. if you are going to say that without proof, show the proof, number one, and then show the solution. not for individual parties but for the country at large. host: that is the politics behind it but as far as specific programs, is there anything you would like to see increased or cut? caller: let me say this across-the-board. what i see now and based on the current climate none of the programs should be cut with the exception of this -- the military budget, which is huge.

at least 3% of that budget across-the-board needs to be reduced. host: let's hear from alan in scottsdale, arizona, republican line. caller: good morning. happy to see c-span again. my key points are real simple. 187 departments in the federal government. i would like to see 25% of that reduced and eliminated. number two, when you go through that side of it the spending is unbelievable. the number one thing is to protect the people of the united states and the last department was space forced by trump. i guess that is helping save the united states from outer space,

but it is these things they are doing, like biden when he took out the oil refineries and took the cost-of-living through the roof. host: you said 25% of programs could be cut. what do you put on the top of that list? caller: the number one? [laughs] 187 departments, man. host: which one is the top of the list for you? caller: what is the number one? what would be interfering with the people? it is too close to call. host: independent line this is jolene in connecticut. caller: it is julian. host: julian. caller: i think we are missing the point.

the military-industrial complex will never get any cuts whatsoever. the only advantage the united states has is it is a worldwide currency. if you look at the exchange between the usd and the russian ruble, the ruble is worth one cent and they still function because they can print money, which is what we do. another point being -- host: would you put military on top of the list then? caller: to cut? host: yes? caller: no. they will never cut the military. host: what program would you cut or like to see increased? caller: if i could finish my point first. host: we only have a limited time. let's hear that. caller: it will be really quick. there is no such thing as inflation. it is currency devaluation. the dollar today buys 19% of

what the 1972 dollar power was. i would cut these stimuli that the government keeps throwing at people and businesses to stay afloat. this is too much money to be thrown around. host: howard is next in indiana, democrat line. go ahead. caller: i would boost health care so we have a universal health care system. increase space force so that we dominate the next frontier of space. i think that is an economic benefit to the whole world because it will allow us to tap into the resources of the entire solar system as opposed to just a single planet.

i think this whole move to austerity makes no sense in our current climate. our economic footprint is very dynamic. we have a great deal potential but we are arguing over irrational things. we have a sovereign fiat currency. that means the u.s. issues currency sufficient to meet the expenditures it needs. we do not operate on a revenue basis. in other words, we are not drawing from tax proceeds to fund our federal government. that is not how it operates. host: let me ask you this. you said universal health care. what would such a system do for the united states, other than the obvious? why do you think it should be reformed? caller: because it would free the individual to pursue the best life for themselves and the best economic opportunity for themselves, which would result

in the best outcome for our nation. it would increase our economic capacity. for example, if we had universal health care, an individual would be free to look at jobs anywhere in the country without worry about health care. that is one example. the second example, they would not have to worry about health care further family. if they are still blessed with parents, they do not have to worry about health care with their parents. bottom line i think we do not budget to the economic capacity of our nation. we budget to some false constraint about revenue and expenses which do not apply when you have a sovereign fiat currency. host: gotcha. we will leave it there. you can add your comments to the mix. (202)-748-8001 for republicans, (202)-748-8000 four democrats, (202)-748-8002 for independents. you can text us at (202)-748-8003. the new york times looking at

the cbo's estimates, drawing this comparison over many administrations. when it comes to america's debt it is the product of policy choices and economic shock largely since the turn-of-the-century when the federal government spent less money than it received in taxes. tax cuts by president george w. bush, barack obama and donald trump reduced government revenues. wars in iraq started under bush were not offset by tax increases. obama, trump and biden signed into law trillions of dollars of emergency spending to combat the 2008 financial crisis and pandemic recession. the cbo report confirmed that those costs of providing social security and medicare to retiring baby boomers will grow rapidly in the decade to calm. maybe it is those programs you see the need for a boost or cut. others mentioned the defense department.

maybe there are more than either should be ceiving more money or should be cut. (202)-748-8001 for republicans, (202)-748-8000 four democrats, (202)-748-8002 for independents. paul in chesapeake, virginia. let's go to james in washington, d.c. caller: everybody is talking about going into debt. we borrowed money to give other people. why do you think we are in debt? we give more than we receive. host: foreign aid is where you would start? caller: foreign aid. we should collect the montreat for this kind -- collect money for this country that we gave money to.

we borrow money to give to other countries and than the people of this country have to pay it back. host: al is in missouri, independent line. caller: yes, sir. i have a plan to get this debt under control. first thing we do is get rid of any charities, ngo's and not-for-profit until the debt is paid. then we take the $137,000 cap office social security and go to $100 million only for those programs. but the max is $3000 and you continue the taxes. after $100 million those go directly to the debt with a maximum payment of $3000 a month. that way in 10 years we could be completely out of debt. host: how did you come to those estimations? how did you develop that plan? caller: i like the market and

legal stuff. i figured out if you do those two things, we could be out of debt in less than 10 years. host: as far specific programs, would you like to see those preserved or cut? caller: there could probably be some cutting but what they need to do in congress, because we need to bring the house down from 433 to 100, they need to make a council of common sense and pick a person that makes less than $500,000 a year and make a council of 100 people that do not get paid by the federal government. they can come up with some ideas because at the rate we are going, we are going to have to have a convention of states in order to straighten our government out because there is no other choice. here is the perfect plan and it will work. host: al in missouri offering a plan for resolving budget issues. some of you texting us as well on the programs.

this is from candy saying, programs to boost military, social security, nasa, minimum-wage programs. that should be cut and revamped, stimulus and unemployment funds. mike in florida saying, most of the debt was republican tax cuts for the rich. let's go back to the tax rates we had when ike was in office. stephen in michigan saying, is not spending, it is starting by cutting corporate welfare and rewriting the tax code so everyone pays. some of the suggestions coming in off of our texting. you can post a tweet as well on our twitter feed @cspanwj. wayne in kentucky on the republican line. caller: i got in on the last of this and i do not know all of what you are talking about, but

this is something that concerns everyone. the news has jumped on it like a dog on a bound. host: we are talking about federal programs that should be increased or cut. caller: ok. well, there are several that need to be cut and i cannot see any reason to increase any. host: which do you think should be cut? caller: i have not thought that through. just something that popped into my head. it is not a program but if we could cut down the thievery of all quarters, would have a whole lot. host: let's hear from debbie in michigan, democrat line. caller: hi. i have two suggestions. one, i believe medicare was set up for people that worked and

paid into it. there is a lot of people that collect medicare benefits that never paid into it. i do not believe that is fair or right. the other thing is medicaid. medicaid was made to help people during hard times, not to be a way of life for your entire life. i think both of those need to be looked at. host: as far as -- what led you to that conclusion? why center on those? caller: because of medicare looking at being cut and the money that has been borrowed from it. now it is not going to be able to be self-sufficient any longer, apparently. i feel part of the reason is there is a whole lot of people that made decisions not to work

years ago that are collecting benefits from it. i do not think that is right. host: debbie in michigan. several of you commenting on military matters. this is james from the facebook saying, slash the military budget. every gun built, every bomb built steals money from social security. matthew saying, military should be boosted. all others should be eliminated or drastically cut. that will improve defense. no one is less efficient with money that the federal government. this is a viewer off of twitter saying, social security and medicare should stay the same and everything else should be cut. national debt is the greatest threat to national security. you heard the congressional budget their estimation on what they expect over the next years when it comes to debt and those matters. that presentation if you are interested in seeing the whole

thing, a couple of ways you can do that. go to our website at c-span.org, you can go to our app at c-span now if you want to hear the presentation from the cbo. one of the people commenting on matters of the economy yesterday was president biden himself traveling to maryland. talked about in light of everything else being talked about, here is president biden from yesterday. pres. biden: we made a lot of progress with republican health. sometimes we had to go it alone but a lot of the progress we made is because we worked together. sadly, from what i am hearing from the new leader of the house of representatives, they are suggesting this is come to an end. that would be a big mistake for america. some of our republican friends in the house were talking about taking the economy hostage over the full faith in credit of the united states. they say unless i accept their

economic plans, which is totally irresponsible, they are not going to pay the national debt which took 200 years to accumulate. we cut the debt by $1.7 billion the last two years. this is a 200 year obligation that has been accumulating. i made it clear in the state of the union i will not negotiate whether or not we pay our debt. i will not allow this nation to fall. i met with the new speaker of the house about how we should proceed to settle our differences. he is a decent guy. here's what i suggested. instead of threats about the fall, which would be a catastrophe in the first time america's full faith in credit would be not met, let's have a conversation about how to grow the economy, grow jobs and reduce the debt. host: viewer offer twitter suggests when it comes to programs to be boosted, education. spending more to help our

children and schools and teachers. another says to eliminate the department of education and the department of energy. i have a long list of other useless places to cut. there is another way to reach out @cspanwj. in ohio, independent line, this is joe. caller: good morning. how are you doing today, pedro? host: i am well. thank you. caller: the first thing i would do is i would erase the limit on social security withdrawals. i believe when i was working it was $120,000 and after that they quit taking out social security. i would erase that so people could continue to pay as much as you are making to pay into

social security. the second thing i would do is since we are in the top 40% of wage owners, pay 100% of the federal debt and the bottom 50% do not pay a dime. i would make everybody pay. just like when joe biden pushed charging taxes on social security. i would charge taxes on every dime everybody gets in government grants. no more freebies. everybody pays their fair share. host: that was joe in ohio. lane in kentucky, republican line. lane in kentucky, good morning. caller: good morning. host: go ahead. caller: the first thing we need to do is we need to stop and

realize that old people need more and we need to make social security more. also, with the current programs the poor are getting taxed more. we need to lower the taxes for the poor and make the rich pay their fair share. host: one of the things phil's waggle brought up yesterday was the recent cost-of-living increase. does that affect you if you are on social security? caller: no but the cost-of-living is outrageous in this country. we need to lower taxes for the common man. the workingman is the foundation of this country. if we let that fall, the entire country goes into shambles and we may see a second civil war. thank you and goodbye. host: deborah in maryland, democrat line. good morning. caller: good morning.

i would suggest you are asking the wrong question. you should also include or make an option what taxes need to be raised. that is the real problem. i am 73-years-old. nobody talked about the debt until reagan came along and started slashing taxes left and right. that is when we started tripling and quadrupling the debt. what needs to happen for all of you people who want to "make america great again," i am assuming you are talking about in the 1950's, 1960's and 1970's when the tax rate was at 90%. taxes have to go up to a minimum of what they were when clinton came in, which ended up balancing the budget for the first time in -- that was the first act he did. host: gotcha. but since we are talking about programs, what programs would you boost or cut? caller: i think social security

needs to be boosted although i get a lot out of it and i should not complain. i probably get the maximum but i would look carefully at defense. i do not see that things need to be cut. taxes are too low. it is not an all-time low but close to it. host: you made those points. here is linda in new york, republican line. caller: we need to boost transportation, especially railroads. we are at the danger point as illustrated by the tragic accident in the midwest. we took a train trip from california past denver into the midwest and when you went through the deserts it was so bumpy because i do not think it was maintained through the sand.

at the top of the mountain the train tracks were not usable and they had to bring people in front of us and watch them repair the tracks. i watched the congressional hearing about two decades ago and they were pleading, please fix the railroads. i assume not much was done on maintenance. in world war ii, we had the soldiers traveling by train. now we have all kinds of goods traveling by train. they are part of the supply chain. we have no backup. we have freight traveling on passenger lines. they are sharing the tracks, which could be really bad if we have an accident like we did and passenger trains were involved. that is what i would boost. i would boost the railroads so we have backup. for my past career, let's get back to the backup. host: what was your past career?

was it in railroads? caller: no. i was a research person. i researched transportation, utilities. host: are you a frequent rail passenger? caller: i am not. i would love to be but i am retired on a limited budget. host: got it. i think the first call on transportation during the segment talking about railways and the need for boosting those programs. let's hear from charlie in washington, d.c., independent line. caller: i do not think we are having the right conversations. so, everything we are taught is wrong. the idea that we have to collect taxes is wrong. the taxes are collected because the american people mortgage to the private banks. host: as far as programs go is what we are talking about. when it comes to programs boosted or cut, would you go for

either option? caller: the economy is like a marathon runner who has a plastic bag on his head. host: let's go to mary in mississippi, democrat line. caller: good morning. the republican callers are cutting so much stuff but cannot name specifics. that is really interesting. we know there are few republicans in d.c. that want to cut medicare, social security and those programs, but we pay into those programs. and those that get substantial income after they retire still pay income taxes and all that stuff. but in my opinion what should be boosted is our education department funds and mental health.

those things are really necessary and our law enforcement as well. $3000 cap is ok but it should continue. we should also cut those corporate companies, they get too much money from the federal government. the republican callers will not say specifics, and yet, we know there are republicans trying to cut these benefits. host: you offered specifics. you said education, mental health and, i believe, military. why those three? caller: education, mental health and law enforcement. host: why those three? mary, are you there? caller: yes. host: what it is about those programs you think need to be assisted? caller: mainly in the south

where i am i noticed the state of tennessee is trying to put more guns on the street by lowering the age to carry. the crimes extremely high. these things need to be supported, including mental health, because we have these shootings at school campuses and all the nonviolence and stuff. some of it is mental health issues. they should be boosted and look at to give assistance to try and cure those problems. host: thank you for explaining. steve in texas, republican line. caller: yes, sir. i am a republican and all these billions of dollars that we are putting out money for the

illegals coming over here, we are having to house them and feed them. i have relatives down at the texas border and my niece has broke her leg about two weeks ago and she could not even get into an er room. her parents have been living down there for years and years, and her grandparents, and they have been funneling money to the hospitals but when it comes time for my niece that broke her leg, she could not even get into the hospital because there were so many into the er room. they are the ones paying for the hospital. she had to drive almost 100 miles to find another hospital to take her with her broken leg. i mean, it is ridiculous and we are paying billions and billions of dollars for this illegals,

that some of them are bringing drugs and fentanyl across the border, and we are paying billions of dollars to feed and clothe them. we need to get out of this stupid climate change stuff. china don't care. the communist murderers do not care about climate change. host: steve in texas. one of the people on this program yesterday was president trump's former obm director. talked about issues when it comes to spending and ways congress should approach spending. here is his perspective. [video clip] >> the last 30 years we have been in a strategic cul-de-sac for people like me that call themselves fiscal hawks. we have got no cuts, no reforms, no savings since 1997. that is what i want to change. i want to change the paradigms people like me who wake up in the morning concerned about the debt.

all they care about is social security and medicare. if you do not have a cut in one of those programs, you somehow have not done anything for fiscal responsibility. and yet, there is $3000 in nondiscretionary spending that i can talk about. i think that is far easier to cut because congress has a vote on it every year and it is the stuff the american people see in their lives. it is not something as hard to tackle as mandatory spending. we need to tackle mandatory spending as well and that is $6 trillion in savings based on changes in the trump budget that are not social security and medicare benefits. there is a way to tackle this. start with nondefense discretionary, go after the easier welfare-type reforms, and you could be on the road to balance fairly quickly. host: if you want to see that interview, you can go to our website and the c-span now app.

the washington post looks at the announcement from the cbo yesterday. they had this. the poor picture reflected in the recent uptick in federal spending, particularly after lawmakers approved new money to care for veterans and boost the military, as well as the persistent problem of high inflation and rising interest rates. the economic forces have made spending and borrowing more expensive for the government much as it has for millions of families nationwide. those factors are also expected to cause a further drag, resulting a halt to growth this year. a measure of the country's output with the economy rebounding next year as prices decline in on a planet rises. talking about those program programs youhink should be boosted or cut. (202)-748-80 for republicans, (202)-748-8000 for democrats,

and indepennts (202)-748-8002. this is leonard leonard joins us from california on the line for democrats. caller: good morning. the internal revenue service needs to be boosted. they cannot handle the returns as it is right now. we need to make them bigger so they can go after these billionaires that hire the people that can handle those income tax returns. there is a lot of money there we are not collecting. that is the way i feel about it. the other thing the government is having is when they voted in citizens united. we are letting all of these billionaires control government to some extent. anyway, that is my opinion. boost the internal revenue

service and we can get the money we need to pay all of our bills. host: danny whirpool talked about his plans for the agency should he become head of the irs. the wall street journal writes he outlined what he called "a rebalancing" of the agency's priorities and hoped to improve customer service "following the passage of the inflation reduction act, americans expect a more high-performing irs." he went on to say, "if i am fortunate enough to be confirmed, the audit and compliance priorities would be focused on enhancing capabilities to make sure america's highest earners comply with applicable tax laws." they would not raise that on

households making less than $40,000. here is roy in georgia, republican line. caller: i pay into social security to pay for my benefits. if i go to the doctor, they pay my bill. if i do not go to the doctor, the money accumulates i would assume. [indiscernible] but someone on medicare

advantage, that money comes out each and every month. you are depleting social security to pay private insurance companies premiums. what i suggest they do is they need to modify social security to pay some of the advantages under medicare advantage. all these private insurance companies are operating at a profit. social security is paying the money each month and they are operating at a deficit. i think they need to look at medicare advantage and medicare. host: let's hear from abishuk in washington, d.c.

caller: i think we need to boost the efforts to integrate undocumented immigrants into american society. i think it would benefit overall society. we talk about the deficit with medicare and social security. that has been the focus this week. a large part of that is the change in demographics. we have a significantly aging population and most immigrants who come in our young, they work hard, they pay taxes. there is always the suspicion that we are feeding or housing them. they pay their taxes and they contribute a substantial amount of social security and medicare spent a chirp. that is what i think we need to focus on, getting immigrants integrated.

they can carry on what they want for their lives. host: are you talking about programs to streamline the process of immigrants coming into the country, becoming american citizens? when you say integration programs what do you mean? caller: both. becoming an american citizen takes multiple years whether you are coming in as an asylum seeker, but even once you get to the city most undocumented people have a target city they are trying to get to. maybe because of a family friend or a family member. getting to that person is really important and can be streamlined. a lot of the east coast cities like washington and new york did a great job when people were bused here. they did not want to come here. they had other cities in mind and we helped them get to their

target cities. getting them set up with the personal infrastructure you need. you need a drivers license. you need a couple of days of food and clothes or a couple of weeks, a place to stay. but once these people get on their feet they are able to pay taxes even though they are undocumented. they do submit paperwork every year. host: ron in the d.c. metro area in fairfax, independent line. caller: good morning. i think the highest priority for the government is our well-being. that would be health care. this insurance based system is maddening. anybody who has had to beg an insurance company to pay a bill, they should be sensitive to that. single-payer health care is what

we need. where does the money come from? look at the cost of these programs. we have spent $8 trillion on the war on terror. health care is everything to this country. food is really cheap. there is always somewhere cheap to live but health care makes us live on the edge. we are always one hard time or one broken bone away from bankruptcy. i think that should be the primary focus of our spending in this country, not defense. the one click you played with the omb director, whenever you hear a politician say cut nondefense discretionary spending, you should reject them. they are just hawks who want to keep this in saint foreign policy going. host: that was president trump's

former omb director. you can hear that on the website or the app. when you go to the page of the wall street journal today, they take a look at reports from the cbo yesterday and put a couple of charts together looking at what is pushing the national that to its limit. one of the factoids saying, federal debt held by the public, not including intergovernmental holdings, reached 100.3% of gdp in 2020, the result of multitrillion dollar physical responses to the pandemic and the sharp drop in economic output. economic downturns often expand the deficit on two fronts, the government spends more on social fronts and a cooling economy lowers tax revenue. it takes a look at the announcements from yesterday. we are using this to talk to you about programs. whether programs you think need to have more money put into them

or programs that should be cut. (202)-748-8001 for republicans, (202)-748-8000 for democrats, independents (202)-748-8002. diane in north carolina, republican line. caller: hi. thank you. i have been listening to other callers talking about health care and i agree 100% with the previous callers. i feel like our current health care system is unsustainable. in our family, i look at the amount of money we have spent for our insurance premiums. if you add that money up plus your deductibles, we could have had two brand-new cars sitting in our driveway with the cost of health care for two years for our family. i think the average american family is facing the same thing. the high cost of insurance -- there is no limit to the greed

of the insurance industry, the medical industry, the medical device industry, the pharmaceutical industry, the hospitals, the doctors. everybody wants to make as much money as possible off the backs of the average citizen. we do not have a health care system, we have a sick care system. they make money off of you if you have anything wrong with you. that is why medicare costs are so high. i think we should go to a single-payer system. if you look at any other industrialized nation on this planet, they have single-payer systems. i am not saying they are perfect but i think in our country, we can come up with a single-payer system that will be better than every other single-payer system on this planet. and save our citizens from ruin

because of the bankruptcies and the nightmare people go through when they lose their jobs. my husband lost his job during covid and millions lost their job during covid. host: diane in north carolina. christine in michigan, you are next. caller: there was a lady a couplellers back and i am amazed at china's train system. they are launching a-new bullet train that is for or anything.nly and not freight but two quarters of the country

have a trainm linking that country together. why can't we have bullet trains here? we have fallen. we are on electric cars but our train system is decrepit. if we go that route and boost our trains, you could have had trains running from washington, d.c. to l.a. bullet trains crisscrossing the country. but if you see china, we are pitiful. we really are when it comes to trains. host: christine in michigan. this is steve on facebook when it comes to taking a look at

programs. anything supporting small businesses and increasing national security should be boosted while world policing should be cut. first obligation of our government is to its citizens. when the citizens are having their needs met, then we can turn our focus outward. he adds noncitizens should never receive preferential treatment over citizens. this is from danny. danny is in south carolina, independent line. caller: how are you doing? host: we can hear you. go ahead. caller: i hear you talking about programs that need to be cut. it is not the programs that need to be cut, it is too many regulations and benefits people are getting out of the programs. you got people that pay into these programs that are not citizens and enjoying benefits from it. the regulations need to be changed. you need to have citizens getting the benefits, not the

foreigners, and you need to have regulations to pay into it to get it. i know people that draw for thousand dollars a month on benefits -- $4000 month on benefits and do not see a dime. if you have too many people paying into it -- i mean, receiving it and not paying into it, that is where you get the deficit. host: danny in south carolina. this is james in new mexico, democrat line. caller: yes. i would say leave social security, medicare and medicaid alone. i am 78-years-old. i have worked since i was 16 and i paid into those programs and i do not think they should be cut. that is all i have to say.

have a nice day. host: republican line, normal in missouri. hello. caller: hello. good morning. host: you are on. go ahead. caller: i have one big thing i think should be cut and that is all the earmarks that go into all the bills that come out, like the last bill that the democrats put through that was thousands and thousands of pages. host: go ahead. you are still on. caller: didn't even have a chance to look at it before they voted on it. but things like, oh, programs to investigate chipmunks and their mating habits and billions of dollars and $2 million for a park in nancy pelosi's area.

that adds up. as far as defense, i do not think we should cut defense at all. we are way behind china. they are way ahead of us. two million men or more, all the rockets and the machinery and military machinery they have that they built. they are way ahead of us. we cannot even meet our quota on our men going into the service and they have got millions in theirs. defense should not be cut. host: you mentioned the earmarks. they eventually go back to the state and districts like yours. do you think that is a detriment when senators want to bring money back to their state? caller: it is one thing if you are using it for things people really need, but investigations on chipmunks or birds or

whatever, their mating habits or the bridge to nowhere that were brought up at the last minute. host: normal in missouri. she finishes off the hour talking about earmarks. thanks for participating, all of you. two guests joining us throughout the morning. first we are joined by russ feingold, president of the american constitution society and former democratic senator from wisconsin for then we will hear from dr. joel zinberg of the paragon health institute, looking at the efficacy of covid lockdowns. little conversations coming up on "washington journal." ♪ announcer: there are a lot of places to get political information.

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full schedule on your program guide or watch online anytime at www.c-span.org/history. >> c-span's american presidents website is your one-stop guides to our nations commanders in chief. from george washington to joe biden, nine short biographies, video resources, and rich images that tell the story of their lives and presidencies all in one easy to browse c-span website. visit www.c-span.org/presidents to export the rich catalog of c-span resources today. >> "washington journal" continues. host: russ feingold served and is now the president of the american constitution society. thank you for joining us. >> good morning and thank you for having me on the show. host: tell me about the

organization, what is it about and how it's funded. guest: the american constitution society was founded after the infamous decision in bushby gore when progressives and moderates and even conservatives realized that the court was becoming very political. it basically decided the presidential election and there was a kneeling that those on the right had sort of come up with a plan to control the legal system especially the courts area this organization was created to say we can't let that happen. that means challenging some of their ideas like originalism and textualism and phony ways of interpreting the constitution, but also this organization reach a national net in over 200 law schools, 55 lawyer chapters of lawyers who are concerned about the legitimacy of our legal system and not wanting works politicized. we are also very active on issues such as wanting to see some reform of the united states supreme court. it includes many lawyers but not

just lawyers. the purpose is to try to make sure we have a legitimate legal system that fits the 21st century. the constitution is applied to the reality of this country in multiracial democracy in the 20th first century -- and the 21st century. host: you served in the senate, talk about the political process involved in the actual process of putting people on the court through the process of approving them through the senate. guest: to weigh the founders and framers decided to set this up was the judges would be appointed by the president but that wasn't the end of the process. only the united states senate has the role of advising and consenting on all nominations so investors and executive appointments of a certain kind but also all federal judges. federal judges are basically lifetime appointments. once the president nominates somebody with various background checks and ultimately, he goes

to the senate judiciary committee which is now chaired by senator dick durbin of illinois. they have hearings and everything goes the way goes and they discuss the person and then vote on the committee and then the nomination is sent to the floor of the senate. when i was in the senate, in theory, you could have required 60 votes to break a filibuster if there was resistance. that was changed by majority leader harry reid in 2013. so now, a majority vote is sufficient to confirm or put a person on the bench for life and actually it was originally just a court of appeals but it was also more recently applied to the supreme court. that's a big change from when i was in the senate but that sort of the process once that person is confirmed by a vote, they are sworn in and they are a judge for life. host: there was news this week in the biden administration, their 100 judge being approved in the senate so what does that suggest to you?

guest: we are thrilled the american constitution society is thrilled about the success. even though the trump people abuse the process, the biden administration was ahead having 97 judges confirmed in two years to trump's 85. now it's gotten off to a slow start this year. they have not only gotten to 100 with the last couple of days, 104 we think today will be 105. that's very impressive it is not just impressive because of numbers. it's impressive because of what they are doing. this administration is historic and the diversity of the people that are being nominated and confirmed. 75 of those 100 people are women, actually 76. 68 are people of color and 49 are women of color. this is literally the opposite

-- i think only 25% of trump's nominees were women and even smaller percentages of diverse people. the goal here is to return judiciary to people who are legitimate judges who don't have a political agenda and are not just partisan but also that they reflect the population of this country, the diversity of the country in terms of personal background but also professional background. this president has nominated in the senate has confirmed a lot of people who were public defenders, people who represented play tapes, people who have been on the side of the little guys we think this is a proud moment but as an organization, we think they have to move faster in the next two years in order to avoid the fact that president trump actually got through 234 judges in four years and that's still a pretty big mountain to climb if you want to achieve that. host: is it a numbers game? guest: that's just a measure. first of all, yes it's important

to make sure that you take the opportunity to undo the damage that was done by senator mcconnell and president trump of putting as many very young, right wing ideologues on the court. that is a numbers game to an extent but the point more importantly is that each individual judge can have a huge impact. each one matters because it might be a federal judge in miami and handling the case having to do with book banning. might have something to do with immigration. each judge matters tremendously so when we measure this in terms of numbers, yes, but in terms of who is nominated, who will represent the judiciary that has been far too biased in favor of white males throughout our history. that is something that has to be done in order for the courts to be seen legitimately area our supreme court and our court system has basically taken a bath in terms of legitimacy. there are polls that suggest only 25% of the american people have a positive you the supreme

court that's because they sense there is a great deal of politicizing going on. the goal here, -- there are many goals, it's replacing people who are extreme but also getting people to feel more confident again that the courts are on the level. that's the most important thing in our society and we believe that courts matter. host: russ feingold is joining us, the president of the american constitution society and served in the senate and if you want to ask him questions -- being outside of the senate, other ways to streamline the process that would satisfy both sides? guest: i'm not sure it would satisfy both sides but there are ways the process should be streamlined. i will talk first about the lower courts first. we have proposed is an

organization, three changes be made to move this process more weakly. that is to get rid of this thing most people haven't heard about called the blue slip. there's a procedure in the senate where if there is a judge nominated for the federal court, the district court in your state, they send you a blue slip of paper and you are supposed to sign off and approve this nomination. this is a senate tradition that the idea behind it is it sort of to make sure nobody seems bad gets in. it has a very dubious background. this was used by senator james eastland of mississippi, the chairman up to judiciary committee during the civil rights hero to make sure that only segregationist judges would be appointed in southern state. it's got a bad history. during the recent years when the republicans were in charge of the senate, they got rid of these loop slips for the court of appeals. they said we are going to ignore

this tradition. now the democrats in the position with many vacancies happening for the district court across the country have had to decide if they are going to let republicans use this failure to return loose lips as a way to prevent judges from being confirmed over the next two years and we had taken of you that that would be a mistake. this is not require a formal rule change, it's up to the chairman of the committee, and we have urged senator durbin to consider this and i think he is. i think he's trying to give the republicans a chance to not obstruct but we feel that may have to happen. there are other changes we think should occur in order to speed up the appeals process. right now, you just need a majority to get past the filibuster for a court of appeals judge which is a high court lifetime appointment. you just need a majority but once have shown you have a majority, they still have 30 hours of debate in the senate on that nomination. that makes no sense because

obviously the votes are already there and is just wasting time. they like to say in the senate that even though it's about money and politics, in the senate, time is more important than money. what gets the attention? using all that time when you would only have two hours for district court judgeship doesn't make sense.you should consider a number of nominations at the same time as they do for executive women's. those are three things that should be viewed as neutral but some republicans would say that's only to help you now. it would presumably be a permanent change that would benefit both parties. host: russ feingold of the american constitution society serves as their president. our first call come from south carolina come republican line. go ahead. caller: my name is chuck and i'm from south carolina. it's good to see you, mr. feingold. i've been watching politics for

40 years. i think what happened with the supreme or was fdr was in office and by the time he left, he had a really liberal court. it stayed that way and that's how roe v. wade got through. it wasn't until republicans started getting the majority in the senate that democrats started coming up with ideas and how to reform the court area i think the court is fine. probably in 10 years, it's going to be ruling the way i don't like. there is a line in the court -- the constitution is always ignored. anything that is not enumerated in the constitution is left to the states. i'm a republican to the core and i think that should be the guiding principle of the united states. there is too much federal government and i'm a states

rights guy forever. it's good to see you and i miss you. guest: so nice of you and i appreciate it. a lot of what you said makes sense. i grew up believing that the court was on the level. you had a chief justice warren who was a republican. he was from bakersfield, california, republican governor california and came on the and wrote the brown decision. that was for civil rights. justice brennan, many people like me who are more liberal have always considered him one of the greatest justices. he was a republican and president kennedy appointed the football star. he was very conservative and some liberals didn't like that and he was one of the two that voted no on roe v. wade. we used to say it looks like these guys get on the court and they decide they have to act like judges. the problem is, that has changed

and that has changed and now we have people on the court who clearly are showing they have a political agenda. it's so unfortunately predictable what they will do. that was demonstrated in the dobbs case, the abortion case where they throughout 50 years of president. there was aperiod where president could appoint more people but in my lifetime, there has never been a democrat appointed and confirmed as chief justice. i'm about to turn 70 years old. not once. when we have a court where it's perceived that there is a party by us going on in the court, is not easy to believe it will be returned to a situation where people can be comfortable. our goal is not to turn it into a liberal court. the goal is to make it seem legitimate, to make it be legitimate, to make people feel the judges are actually ruling on the facts of the law, not on their own political preferences.

that's where we are at on that. host: lake geneva, wisconsin, independent line. caller: thanks for taking my call. i would like to talk about the upcoming election in election -- in wisconsin. you say you don't think the judges should show a bias one way or the other. a liberal judge from milwaukee, she is pretty much saying in her tv ads that she is going to vote to overturn republican districting gerrymandered maps and laying out her protocol. it's happening in her ads which is against the state constitution. . it's not only against it but is not regarded to be -- it's not

something they should be doing. she saying she will vote on a case when she's not a justice and she's running to be adjusted so she's telling how she will vote beforehand. you said earlier about joe biden has hired more judges due to their sex or race or their gender. don't you think the best person for the job, no matter what the race, color, creed or religion or anything personal shouldn't have anything to do with it? it's who should be most qualified for the position. guest: i agree with that and president biden was on the judiciary committee when i was there for 16 years the people that he has appointed and have been confirmed are the best people. they happen to be finally representative of the population of this country which is important. for far too long, people with

those backgrounds were not given a fair shark dish a fair shot. they are normally qualified starting with our newest supreme court justice, justice jackson and i am comfortable and happy about that. speaking about wisconsin and i love lake geneva, 25 miles from where i grew up, we've had a problem in wisconsin for too many years of the court being politicized. it did not start with this race. i know the judge you are referring to is not the only one who is being pushed to state positions about how they would rule. my understanding is she is not -- has not said has not said had she will ruin any case. she has a long record of circuit court judge where he has -- where she has shown itself to be independent. we have representation problem in the wisconsin. it appears bias politically, more on the conservative side

during the last few years. that is very damaging. i hope that if there is a change on the wisconsin supreme court, he can begin and you are where things don't look like they will always be4-3. one of the conservative judges who has decided occasionally with some of the more liberal judges on the wisconsin supreme court so there is some hope. i have no idea how this election will turn out but i can assure the viewers that the judge he mentioned is not the only one who is being put in this position with regard to people demanding positions on issues. normally in the past, that would not have been addressed by candidates for the wisconsin supreme court. host: you probably saw the story from a couple of weeks ago, senator john eddie from louisiana rationing a judge being nominated to be a district judge and couldn't answer basic lessons about the constitution.

does that show a larger issue as far as the biden nomination and who they are putting forward? guest: my guess it was more of a one off. i have seen senator kennedy do this or to gotcha weapons. some of he asked were maybe i could've answered but teaching constitutional law, this is not necessarily the way you want to do the confirmation process. i know that has not been a problem with most of these nominees because they have asked them tough lessons and they have been able to answer them but in a number of cases, the people got through committee with one or two republican votes. i do not think by any means the people being appointed are unqualified. we look pretty closely at the recommendations and the people we have recommended -- recommended, heard of people nominated have been people we recommended. they are people who we have carefully vetted and we believe they are highly qualified.

host: senate minority leader mcconnell took the floor to talk about that story and put it in historical context when he came to supreme court nominations. let me play you what he said. [video clip] >> the judiciary committee recommended judge coney barrett a little over two years ago. she literally dazzled the country with her force of intellect. at one point, hours into a hearing, after being asked multipart questions about constitutional law, no justice barrett was asked to hold up the notepad she had been provided to keep everything straight. it was completely blank. she hadn't even touched it. justice barrett isn't intellectual this is not an intellectual outlier but she is

an appropriate stand-in for the judicial nominees the republican senate has confirmed for 2017-2020. caller: host: there is the example he gave, what is your response? guest: i think senator mcconnell must've somehow missed the most recent supreme court nomination. why doesn't he say that about catania brown jackson who was brilliant in that hearing? i was on the judiciary for 16 years but largely justice barrett was treated with respect. i feel that kataji brown jackson was treated badly. they were just plain rude to her but she was unflappable i never saw a point in the process where she wasn't capable of handling questions. she was brilliant and the reviews even from the conservatives on the supreme court now says that's who she is. why would senator mcconnell make a big deal about the barrett

nomination and not acknowledge that the most recent one was a tremendous nominee, and historic nominee but a nominee who is an honestly qualified. it's not fair to only talk about one thing. host: bill is in new york on our line for democrats, good morning. caller: good morning, senator. i'm different than the other callers. i think every judge gets confirmed whether for the trial of the supreme court if they qualify for the job my problem with the supreme court is not so much since there is a liberal or conservative wing, it's that every one of these appointees have an ivy league school background. they all served in the judiciary in lower positions. they are all too much the same.

in spite of the differences that appear in the press and complaints about the differences, if you look at all of the cases in every term and every one of these cases have difficult problems. 80% of them are decided before and they are too much alike what do you think? guest: i happen to agree with you. i've been concerned for years that the united states supreme court is beginning to look more like a priesthood where you have certain steps you have to go through and if you don't go through those exact steps which means going to a very good law school but also means becoming a judge at a young age and having very little contact with the rest of society. i mentioned earl wall -- earl warren,, sandra day o'connor. i think it's good to have a

mixture of experience and backgrounds of the people who have a real life experience where they are not required to be so careful which judges have to do is important for informing the thinking and debate and deliberations on the supreme court. going forward, i hope there will be people that don't just fit that model. that used to be the way it was. i think it's damaging the institution because people have a hard time relating to nine people who seem to be almost completely from the same sort of training background and career background. it's not adequate. host: there is a viewer who suggests term limits for the courts anything's 12 years is enough. when it comes to the actual changes as far as term limits for the supreme work, what do you think? guest: we think that's right,

there needs to be term limits. this is not something i would have said in the past. we felt the warren court was on the level and even the burger court and others but the problem now is this supreme court was stolen. it was stolen by mitch mcconnell and donald trump. they deny president obama's right to fill seats and they basically stole future president biden his opportunity to fill the ginsberg c. the court has been basically stolen in terms of the legitimacy of who is actually on the court. we need reform. we need to do something because these folks are in their early 50's mostly and they will be there for probably 30 years of something has to be done to undo this unfair attack on the legitimacy of the court area the first thing we think we should do is add seats. congress and the president can add seats, it's been done before and that something you want to do but given the theft of these two seats, we think and many other people think, that needs to happen in the near term. secondly, we support having term

limits. one of the callers said, the conservatives were the first ones to talk about that. they proposed an 18 year term limit. we don't weigh in on the exact time. these people can continue his other federal judges but an 18 year term limit. most people might think that requires a constitutional amendment which is hot -- which is hard but many scholars think you don't need it. we support the kinds of reforms you were alluding to. we think there should be an ethics code for the court, they don't have one. the other federal judges have had one. they have to have a basis for when they fail to recuse themselves in a case, there is not a real gift ban. they can receive gifts and travel i make sure those rules were applied to members of congress. there ought to be some reform of the so-called shadow docket which is a kind of hidden docket

that supposed to be for emergencies but it's being used in many cases for very important decisions, where they don't issue a real opinion. we support a whole range of reforms and we think this is the moment where this has to happen. host: you talked about the stolen seats and i assume you mean justice kavanaugh injustice eric. what you think of their performance to date? guest: this court has become highly politicized. even though they may be intellectually capable, these decisions such as the dobbs decision were simply lawless. it literally took 50 years of precedent protecting a woman's right to choose and threw it in the garbage can based on flimsy historical evidence. these justices have been part of that damage and they are on doing any limitations on the so-called second amendment which i happen to believe there is a right to bear arms but they are taking it to an extreme, eliminating laws that we've had

in new york for generations to make sure about how and when you can brandish a weapon and they are taking this to town on especially voting rights. these justices have done enormous damage to the voting rights act and the right of people in this country to have a chance to vote. it began before they were on the court and we are fearful it will get worse in this supreme court term with the cases before it. the most fundamental right, the right to vote is being undercut by these justices you mentioned. the combination of them with the ones that were already there really looks like a court that is biased and has a political agenda and does not respect precedent. the president is the whole basis of the legitimacy of the court. the founders did not intend the court to replace congress and the president but that's what they are doing. host: russ feingold joining us, president of the american constitution society.

this is carl from florida on the republican line. caller: how are you? guest: good, thanks. caller: i was nice and calm for the phone call in the fellow before me rattled me. anyway, originally, were talking about how inclusive biden is in this equity stuff. he put 49 lakh women judges on and he's looking like america. the america i grew up in, i'm 67 years old, and it's somewhere between nine and 13% lakh. -- black. how does that look like america? guest: what this is is 49 new judges, women of color who will

start undoing the enormous bias in the other direction. the hundreds of federal judges are overwhelmingly white males and maybe it will reflect the population in the end but with these changes, it doesn't come close. the historic record is that black women and others have not had the same fair chance to be on the word. this is merely making up for historical discrimination. it's very clear to the viewers this does not mean that 49 women on the court or black,. host: democrats line from new jersey, here is richard. caller: good morning. originalism, i was watching the debate about the woman who didn't [indiscernible] and i watch for two hours in the never heard them ask for the definition of words. they totally ignored the text

and they went back to some originalist bs and therefore come up with any answer they want. it's crazy. is it possible to pass a law in congress that says they have to stick to the text? use the dictionary from the 18th century, i don't care but go by the text. you can come up with anything you want, look for the right founding father to express your view and that's how you come to an answer? the idea that citizens can carry guns, it's not in the text at all. anybody who can read can see that. this is a big problem as far as i can tell. guest: you are right in this use of originalism and textualism, it shouldn't be the whole analysis.

you are right, they use this in a phony way. the user to get the result they want, pick and choose the words and the laws about portion from a certain time on they don't look at traditions from another time. it's completely manipulative. it's not an a legitimate intellectual approach of people have to realize when people talk about originalism and textualism, they are not really following the intent of the founding fathers. the intent was that the people of this country be able to adapt the constitution to the times we are in. george washington said at the adoption of the constitution before it was sent for ratification, he said he will support this because thank got under article five of the constitution, it can be amended. is that the people of his time certainly will not have more wisdom or understanding than

those of the future. the idea this get tied to some mythical idea of what was going on in 1789 is usually used in a bogus way. we need a more holistic look at what the law it to be understood as now. the framers adopted a document that was sufficiently flexible to adapt to a period like the 21st century. it's only the people demanding this cramped version of reality and words that are causing it not to be adaptive host: host: in that way. is that a congressional issue as far as making changes to the constitution? guest: it would be ideal of congress didn't have to wait and whether the work had -- whether the court had to do this. one way is to have two thirds of both houses propose an amendment and three forts of the state have to prove that. that's the only way it has ever succeeded. there is another mechanism which is the calling of the constitutional convention that can be done by two thirds of the states applying for a

convention. i've just written a book about this with the student of mine. it warns that the far right is trying to call one of those conventions in a way that would allow each state to have one vote so we can really undo the constitution. my book is the constitution in jeopardy and addresses the fact that we need to be able to amend the constitution but we probably have to change the way it works because it doesn't end up being a vehicle to understand the basic test the basics of 1789. host: from virginia, go ahead. caller: i am old enough to remember judge amy coney barrett not knowing first amendment freedoms in her confirmation hearing. i'm interested in knowing whether you think related to your book whether a constitutional convention is more likely and i want to know if you think the blue slip

process will make the president less likely to consult with home state senators. finally, will you run for president in 2024? guest: the last one is the easiest, no i will not. secondly, yes, we have to get rid of these blue slips. having been in politics and in the senate for 18 years, just because there is a blue slip process or not, that's not going to change the fact that a president generally will want to consult with a senator and say we are thinking of appointing this person. generally, presidents want to be on the best side of members of the senate so they can get things through the senate. they will continue to consult i'm guessing almost about the same. i don't think the blue slip process is the real deal. we are concerned in terms of a constitutional convention even though it's a legitimate mechanism that's in the constitution that the so-called convention of the states, people are trying to put together a convention that will be so

biased in terms of delegations that each state whether it's wyoming, california, the same boat. you would have the problem we already have, filibuster and each state having to senators in the electoral college we don't have a majority system in this country. i understand their needs to be some limitations on it. if you have a constitutional convention where a simple majority of the states can undo things like the power of congress, the power of dealing with environmental issues, that would be damaging and take his back to the articles of confederation which were the reason they had to go to philadelphia to do something new in 1787. we are concerned about it and fortunately, on recent boats, this effort of the convention of the state has failed. in montana and this weekend nebraska it's not moving forward but they are trying to get to the 34 state applications that would allow them to require

congress to call a constitutional convention. host: as far as the supreme court cases that you are interested in following, which ones are being herded? guest: i'm concerned about the cases that have to do with independent state legislature theory. it's the idea that somehow the state legislature come in this case north carolina can ignore concerns by the north carolina supreme court about whether or not the legislative plan is legitimate. we are worried about this because it's not just about reapportionment, import -- important as that is for the right to vote but it can be applied to anything potentially. they could potentially say we will decide who won the election. we will not consider what the majority of people voted in north carolina and we will not consider what the supreme court in north carolina did so it's a crazy notion that a state government, whatever powers the state has come is only the legislature which are often gerrymandered. it doesn't include the people

and doesn't includes is just the supreme court so it's a term in this concern. we are concerned about the affirmative action case where there is a strong possibility that the very long commitment to affirmative action and universities will be undercut or destroyed. given the progress in this country in dealing with the historic founding failures of our constitution and racism in this country, to undo the work that affirmative action has done in our universities i think would be a tragic moment. we are very concerned that could come out of this court. this court is not on the level, it has an agenda that has been present for many years and one of their things they wanted to do is to simply undo this important way of changing the fact that this country was based on very severe discrimination which continues to this day. host: this is from kiki, democrats line. caller: the first supreme court when after muslims and then

voting rights and union rights, women's rights in said religious schools could take taxpayer money. they destroyed the epa and they are going after gay-rights and who is handing mentally ill people weapons, terrorists. keep it classy. this turned congress into an escort service. where they get their people from the jerry springer casting pool? guest: i haven't heard of jerry springer in a while. i don't necessarily agree with every word but yes, the problem is the work looks like it has a political agenda and it's a far right little agenda. it's trying to underage dish undo many decades of congressional action and court decisions and trying to make this a better society, a more tolerant society, a society where can feel like one people

instead of having one side nominate the other. this is an attempt to basically create not a my note a protection of minorities and make sure the majority doesn't oppress the minority but it's trying to put in place minority domination of our political system. that is their agenda and the court unfortunately seems to be reflecting it and that's why it's reputation is in the dumpster. host: great falls, virginia, daniel, republican line, hi. caller: thanks for taking michael. a couple of comments -- i get it that you are not in favor of originalist interpretation of the constitution but if you have a living constitution, what you have is a dead constitution. you have no principles on which to go on. you talk about politicizing the court, the court has been politicized by the left for 100 years.

fdr tried to pack the supreme work. our current president who did a character assassination on robert bork and clarence thomas. it's been going on for so long. then you talk about -- host: we will leave it to those two, thanks for calling. guest: i don't reject the idea that you want to look at what the original intent is as part of your analysis of the constitutional case. you look at the text but you have to also look at the era we live in and whether or not the application to the current situation makes sense. how does the court look at the fourth amendment? unreasonable searches and seizures? does that apply to searching your phone? the founders didn't know that. that has to be applied to current circumstances. if you look at the answers thatkatanji-brown jackson gate,

she says my job is to look at every kind of source, original intent, the text and what's been said since and what's happened in society and rule the best you can instead of having some kind of unprincipled commitment to political objectives. i think it should be a combination of things and in the end, judges should act like judges rather than politicians. host: one more call from bob in kansas, democrats line. caller: hi, this is bob. i wanted to ask russ feingold about right conspiracies. how in the world does senator ron johnson able to continue to win with all the lies he spews? guest: well, i am not a political pundit. i will leave that question to others who are more capable. host: what have you learned

about the legal system being outside of congress? guest: i knew this but i didn't know it as intensely as i do now. courts really matter i don't care who you are, everybody needs a doctor. people like doctors without borders even though they are not doctors but people care about what we do at the american constitution society because we believe these courts affect everything in our lives, whether it's a business deal or you have a kid in school you think should be able to read a book about roberto clemente and they are trying to prevent kids in florida from doing. the court to where the action is and if you don't have ports that are legitimate where people feel they get a fair deal, that undercuts our whole system government. i knew that but i feel it much more intensely than i used to. host:acslaw.org, the president russ feingold who served in the

senate, thanks for your time. we will have open forum but about a half hour from now, we will be joined by dr. joel's in berg look --zinberg looking at the impact of covert across the united states but open forum before that. call it now and we will take those when "washington journal" continues. ♪ >> there are almost 80 new members in the 118th congress in this diverse group includes first-generation americans and a record number of women and minorities. c-span interview more than half of them about their up ringing. and political philosophies. on monday at 8 p.m. eastern,

watch coverage of the 118 congress on c-span or online at c-span.org. >> c-spanshop.org c-span's online store. browse through our latest collection of c-span products, apparel, books, home decor and accessories. there is something for every c-span fan and every purchase helps support our nonprofit operations. shop now or anytime at c-span shop.org. >> historian robert keagan has been writing about foreign affairs for most of his 60 years. his first book on foreign policy was published in 2006 and focused on u.s. history before

the founding up to the spanish-american war. he is a senior fellow at the brookings institution and has just completed the second book in the trilogy titled the ghost at the feast. america and the collapse of world order, 1900-1941. in conclusion, he writes -- >> historian robertkagan on this episode of book notes+ available on the c-span now app were wherever you get your podcast. >> since 1979, in partnership with the cable industry, c-span has provided complete coverage of the halls of congress from the house and senate floors to congressional hearings, party

briefings and committee meetings. c-span gives you a front row seat to how issues are debated and decided with no commentary, no interruptions and completely unfiltered. c-span, your unfiltered view of government. >> "washington journal" continues. host: you can text during open forum. you can post on anything else on our social media sites. you can also go to our facebook page. the washington post reports that president biden expected today to reference the news of late when it comes to those spy balloon's. no information as far as an exact time or if that would happen today, just that it's expected. stay close to cease it -- to c-span for that. the president is expected to take his physical.

the abc news headline says there are questions about his age. he is expected to undergo that physical today. and at 80, he's the oldest serving present and is considering a second term. someone considering a first term for the white house is nikki haley, former u.n. ambassador rice the trump administration and former governor of south carolina made that announcement formal yesterday. here is a portion of it. [video clip] >> i have an announcement to make -- [applause] >> i stand before you is the daughter of immigrants, as the proud wife of a combat veteran and is the mom of two amazing children. i have served as governor of the

great state of south carolina. [applause] >> and as america's ambassador to the united nations. [applause] >> and above all else, i am a grateful american citizen who knows our best days are yet to come if we unite and fight to save our country. [applause] >> i have devoted my life to this fight and i am just getting started. [applause] >>for a strong america, for a proud america i am running for president of the united states of america. [applause] host: you can see that full announcement on our website at www.c-span.org and also our

c-span now app. our first: open forum is lindsay in connecticut, independent line. caller: good morning and thank you, c-span. i wanted to talk about ohio governor mike dewine. he needs to deal with the aftermath of the train derailment. i appreciate your network has covered this story. what i don't appreciate is that alan block is on your board of directors. are you kidding me? he is ignoring a judge's order to build the wall and fighting his own journalists in pittsburgh. thank you. host: alan block in that call is dealing with the corporate governance side of c-span doesn't impact our editorial side whatsoever. now we will hear from bob in florida, democrats line. caller: good morning. normally i would say thank you for c-span but i'm not much to be thankful for.

how can c-span report -- purport to be nonpartisan when alan block is on your board of directors? he defied federal court orders. thank you. host: michael is next in hagerstown, maryland, republican line. caller: hey pedro, it's michael. i want to go back the to the discussion of things we can cut in government. government is just too bloated. it's the worst provider of services. you can go down the list of departments but i would pick a couple like the v.a. system. we spend over $300 billion in only 20% of that goes to the care of our veterans. simple answer to that is get rid of that system and give every veteran a card and they can go to any hospital and we can cut the budget by about $200 billion and they would get service.

you can take a bunch of money out of education department because the more we spend on education, the worse the numbers get. just go right down the line, thanks. host: patricia in valdosta, georgia, independent line. caller: thank you, i want to highlight the attack on the news media who provide coverage crucial to our democracy. they attacked the government and the people who employ us. alan block should be removed from the c-span board because how he treats employees including the pittsburgh post-gazette. we've been on strike since october. thank you. host: i will just say that again, none of that affects our editorial side as far as the programming we do on this network nor does it affect the programming we do on this show.

we will go to california next, jeff, line for democrats. caller: hi, i want to talk about wokeness. it appears that republicans think we are woke when we catch them committing crimes. republicans are the only ones committing voter fraud, republicans are the only ones that actually got caught on tv going into the capital, donald trump interrupted the riot -- insurrected the riot and he has to be the worst president in the world because he tried to overturn the government. how can you compare him to joe biden?

one last thing, i think we don't have any wokeness. we so republicans committing crimes. that's the only thing we woke up about area we saw it on tv. host: bonnie in modesto, california, independent line. caller: i would like to talk about the court system, the supreme court system for the whole court system. it's kind of like the dutch did with south africa. if you control the court system, you control the country. it doesn't matter how educated the people are or how right they are, you control the court system, you control the country. it's like the dutch did to the south africans. thank you. host: when it comes to voting rights, the associated press reporting that the public today expect to see portions of a

report by a grand jury whether donald trump his allies committed any rhymes while trying to overturn his 2020 election lawson georgia. -- election laws in georgia. some witnesses may have lied under oath and that will be released and any recommendations on potential middle charges will remain under wraps for now. this is an in chicago, democrats line. -- this is ed in chicago, democrats line. caller: hello, pedro, how are you? host: fine, thank you. caller: i am here, can you hear me? host: repeatedly, you are on right now. caller: i have one comment -- donald trump is not fit to clean the toilets in the white house. why are people still trying to hang onto him and this man has put a stain on this country that we will never, ever get rid of

? host: the washington times reporting that when it comes to the house judiciary midi which is led by ohio republican jim jordan, a new call to executives being issued by that committee, saying the chairman is demanding the chief executive officers from facebook and meta and google parent alphabet, microsoft, apple and amazon turn over any committee case and to other companies related to content moderation or suppression. the story says mr. jordan wrote his committee aims to understand how and to what extent the executive ranch co. hearses and colludes with other companies to censor speech. says the goal is to develop new red legislation such as the possible enactment of new statutory limits on executive ranch to work with big tech to restrict the circulation of content and platform users. that's in the washington times.

cornelia is on a republican line in idaho, hello. caller: hi, good morning. i'm just calling because i only caught part of the program this morning with senator feingold. i hope you have somebody that will balance what he was saying our court system has been left leaning for about a hundred years. anyway, we haven't had a real conservative majority on the supreme or and why they want to come in and change the whole supreme court -- anyway, i hope to god that we never do that because think of the slaughter of unborn innocence that have taken place since roe v. wade

was ok'd by the supreme court. we don't want to become a host: that is cornelia in idaho. on the democratic line. caller: i want to talk about mike pompeo potentially running for president. i don't think he is going to be able to win a general election in this country. if you runs people are going to think about him being guilty by association. with donald trump he had such a close relationship during his present -- during his presidency. he has been out war -- at war for months now. host: i will tell you what he told -- what i told others. it doesn't affect our editorial content. in the newspaper this morning the new york times picking up the story in light of the

announcement from senator diene -- senator dianne feinstein that she is going to retire from congress at the end of her term. at least three people are interested in becoming senator from california. adam schiff, katie porter and barbara lee. the story says miss porter, mr. schiff and ms. lee would all usher in ideological shifts. feinstein in recent years has drawn anger from her right from by party observers. mr. schiff has not joined the group. he has increasingly struck progressive tones after once counting himself a member of the blue dogs, a group of conservative democrats rated a victory for either ms. porter, 49 or mr. schiff, 52 signaler a break in a long generational gap as well as chain of regional power. there is more in the new york

times if you want to read that. let's hear from david in north dartmouth massachusetts independent line. caller: i want to talk about the real pill -- the railroad situation in palestine, ohio. this is a failure of our train system. joe biden pump the brakes on the laborers to go on. this was completely preventable. we need to put pressure on our representatives to make sure people affected by this tragedy are compensated fairly. this is a billion-dollar company that only has two weeks of revenue back into their company to make it say for the public and they failed to do so. they completely lobbied our government. in my opinion is a good way to say corruption.

they paid off lower regulations and now we suffer as a society with these consequences from their failure to ride a safe operation. i feel bad so many people trying to call attention to this and it got crushed by the democrats rated -- crushed by the democrats. host: the fbi conducted two searches at the university of delaware connected with the investigation into president biden handling of classified documents rated telling cnn previous under closed -- previous undisclosed -- the library at the university of delaware, home to extensive papers from the president's time in the senate. according to the website investigators retrieved material on two different days. they are now being reviewed by the fbi.

in new jersey, vincent, democrats line, hi. caller: thank you for all you guys do at c-span. president biden's relationship with the labor has had hiccups. under his leadership the national labor support, one of the strongest we have had in a long time. as an example they charge c-span board member with multiple labor laws at his newspaper in pittsburgh over several years. as much as i like the great work you guys do and as much as you want to say it doesn't affect your editorial content, it is not a good look for c-span. host: it doesn't affect our editorial content. but thanks for the call. john, in kansas on the independent line. caller: these allen block people

are bombarding you. i don't think it is very effective. they may think they are going to achieve something but it is tedious. i would like to talk to all of the retirees out there currently receiving social security and medicare. there is a very bad misconception that retirees have that they somehow earned what they are receiving. they only paid for a small fraction. it may be less than a third on average of what they are receiving. the other two thirds is nothing more than welfare. retirees, you are eating your young. you are fatling the next generation of your country. your kids, with debt. so you can enjoy your retirement. it is very shameful. i agree with the caller from new jersey.

no, maryland who said we could do a lot to take out programs like the v.a. which is useless. however, you are not going to get anywhere on this debt problem until and unless you do something with social security and medicare. my suggestion is freeze the benefits for social security right now indefinitely until those ratios get back more in line with what you actually paid for those benefits. and increase medicare premiums right now. host: that is john in clearwater, kansas. there was a hearing on the senate side yesterday taking a look at the issue of fentanyl. one of the people who appeared with the dea administrator and milgram who underwent questioning from senator ted cruz for legislation. here is a portion of that from yesterday. [video clip] >> is that a yes you would agree

cbp officers on the southern border and ports of entry play a critical role on preventing drugs? >> yes, it is the responsibility and a critical one. >> if we decide to cut funds dramatically in half, would you say that was stopped the flow of illegal drugs? >> i referred this to the department of security. what i would say about this, we believe dhs plays -- >> those are talking points. would cutting the number of -- and have stopped the illegal flow of drugs, yes or no? >> i believe it would. >> that is what is happening under the biden information -- the biden administration. more than half are engaged in babysitting, chauffeurs millions of illegal aliens at the border.

they are not on the border, at ports of entry. they are processing the highest rate of illegal immigration in history. democrats in congress have the remarkable claim that the open borders under joe biden has no impact on the record fentanyl and flooding across our border. between october 2021 and october 2020 21 report estimated there were 364,000 got a ways, people that ran away at the southern border. another border patrol officials put the number at 1.2 million. got a ways can vary from terrorists on the terror watch list. in fiscal year 2022, 98 people were encountered on the southern border that we know of. or they can be drug dealers carrying drugs. is that correct? >> i am going to defer questions on the border and ports of entry

to the department of defense. >> the da has no view drugs crossing the border? drug dealers and got a ways are carrying drugs, many of them. >> what we see is mostly tractor-trailers and personal vehicle. >> so you are sticking to the talking points closely. congratulations. if the open borders don't matter, 300 million got a ways don't matter. with 100,000 people dying last year of a drug overdose. host: want to see more of that hearing, you can do so two ways rated go to our website at c-span.org and follow along at our c-span now app. this is from tennessee in vermont. democrat line. caller: hello. thank you for c-span. i want to call in and talk about

the value of c-span in my life. at this point i don't trust any media outlet to come and do this fairly. i ask why allen block is on your board of directors. the judge's orders to follow the law in pittsburgh, in pittsburgh and toledo. if you don't think that can happen to c-span, you are very naive. host: you called us a beacon on the hill. why is that? caller: you are a trusted news source and you have been so far. arms reach very long. tentacles slowly impacting -- a part of the january 6 insurrection and it is in embarrassment for c-span. host: thank you about the kind words for the network and programming. we held ourselves to a high standard when we take on programming.

bringing unbiased opinion, unbiased news coverage. taking a look at issues from a lot of different sized trade editorially, what you bring up and what others have brought up have nothing to do with the editorial content of this program or this network. let's hear from chuck in wisconsin. independent line. caller: i would like to make a statement on systemic racism. my grandson has been in college, uw milwaukee. he is told where he should go, where he shouldn't go. you are putting your life in danger if you go here or there. he is not in danger in a white community. why is a white person in danger

in the black community? maybe there is prejudice that should be looked at on both sides. host: that is chuck in wisconsin. the associated press reporting the open your drug -- should be made available over the counter. on wednesday the panel fda administrator experts voted unanimously in favor of the split -- of this shift. to be used safely and effectively used. the positive vote is not binding. some panel members about the drugs and packaging cause confusion among some people in the company study. alisa in queens new york. democrats line. caller: i want to make one quick statement about desantis down in florida. i want to say to everyone here

that this is america. things that we discussed his american history and it covers american history. that is all i want to say. it covers all the nationalities and everyone in here that call themselves americans. i don't think anything should be , we want to know what american history is and what it is about. it includes black people and everyone else. i want desantis to know that. as far as i know he is from europe. his grandparents came over at the beginning of the 1900s, 20th century. but we are americans and we should know american history. i don't think the background has enough of america's life how things have been here.

i don't think he should say that. it is wrong. host: thanks for calling in. dr. joel zinberg of paragon health institute will talk about the efficacy of covid lockdowns restrictions. we will talk about that. but first, raquel walsh passing away at the age of 82. our video library at c-span. gord features some of her public appearances she made in washington. one of them from 2002 speaking before the national press club. she spoke about fame and politicians in washington.

[video clip] >> just like those guys in vietnam, you came here to see well, how does she look. [laughter] [applause] so let's get this out of the way right now. here it is. [applause] ok, how am i doing? not bad for 40-ish.

i am not that long in the tooth. but then again i have been around since one million years bc. i had to learn something along the way. one thing i know, when i spot a politician with too much showbiz charm and that sparkle when he gets in front of the spotlight, it scares the hell out of me. do we as entertainment -- do we as americans have to be entertained at all times? i liked it better when those running for office were serious expressions because they were the kind of men who spent their lives pouring over the problems of the world. problem is more important than their own egos. call me old-fashioned but i would like to think that someone is burning that midnight oil finding the wisest solution to

the larger issues. >> washington journal continues. host: dr. joel zinberg served on the council of economic advisers from the biden administration from 2020. he currently serves paragon health institute on. what perspective do you take and how are you funded? guest: a variety of individual and corporate and as a schmo sponsors. we endeavor to try to improve health and lower costs of health in this country by empowering patients, increasing -- great

--. when it comes to covid, what is your view of the government's handling gorge mark when it comes to covid what is your position on the government response to covid? guest: we don't have a position per se. what we set out in this study was to see what was the impact of various measures taken to combat covid. we looked to see how did they affect health outcomes, economic outcomes, educational outcomes. we found the severity of those measures had little or no impact on health outcomes but it had tremendous negative outcomes on economic and educational outcomes. host: the headline of the study released by paragon health institute, states with less

covid policies outperform states with more restrictive covid policy. we will continue with this conversation with dr. joel zinberg. if you have more questions and you want to ask more questions, (202) 748-8000, democrats. (202) 748-8001, republicans. (202) 748-8002, independents. guest: the power to regulate and make health policies are reserved to the state. each state would have different health policies. there was tremendous variation in terms of the measures utilized and how long they were kept in place. we compare that with an index of response measures compiled by the school of government response index. it was things like closures of

businesses, closures of schools, masking policies. various suspensions of economic things. we then looked and saw. i mentioned earlier there was no impact of the health outcomes. a real negative correlation between the severities of lockdown measures and economic outcomes as each states gdp and employment measured by there in person schooling. which multiple schools have correlated with test results. what we also did, which was rather unique for this area, we decided to see what impacted the severity of those lockdown measures on people's choices about where to live. we looked at migration.

movement from state to state within the country. we saw there was a big jump from the five pre-pandemic years as compared to two pandemic years that we looked at. a big rise in domestic migration. we also saw there was a strong negative correlation between severity and migration. the more severe the measures imposed, the more people were likely to move out of states to less severe, the more likely people were to move inside those states. host: questions from our guests, (202) 748-8001, for republicans. (202) 748-8000, for democrats. (202) 748-8002, for independents. you can also text your questions at (202) 748-8003.

let's hear from president biden on the state of the union about plans to end the public health emergency aspect of covid. here is the president from the state of the union. [video clip] pres. biden: in the midst of the covid crisis when schools were closed, and we were shutting down everything, let's recognize how far we came in the fight against pandemic itself. the virus is not gone. thanks to the resilience of the american people and the ingenuity of medicine, we have broken the grip. covid deaths are down by 90%. we saved millions of lives and we opened our country back up and soon we will in the public health emergency. [applause] that is called a public health emergency. but we will remember the toll on pain is never going to go away. more than one million americans lost their lives to covid. families grieving, children

orphaned. empty chairs at the dining room table constantly reminding you that she used to sit there. remember them. we remain vigilant. we still need to monitor variance. congress needs to fund these efforts and keep america safe. host: dr. joel zinberg, that was from the state of the union. schools coming up several times in this report. of us a perspective of what states did when it came to schools and what were the end results. guest: some states kept schools closed for in person schooling for 2020 and 2021. and you had other states like florida which in the spring of 2020 began to open up their businesses and their schools. despite that disparity of treatment, you have no difference between a state like

florida and a state like california. even though california had some of the most severe lockdown measures and florida took a more relaxed, common sense protection approach. their health scores are virtually identical. but the education scores are substantially different with california having one of the worst in the nation and florida having one of the best in the nation. host: florida and california coming up several times in this report. why use them as anchors? guest: they epitomized the desperate approaches taken by different states and the differing outcomes from those approaches. they were a good comparison because they are both very large dates. populous states. they are number one and three respectively in terms of their state populations. you had a situation where california imposed very strict

lockdown. kept them for a very long time. florida begin to relax them in the spring of 2020. the outcomes speak for themselves. their health outcomes are virtually identical. the economic outcomes from florida are way above average. the same outcomes for california are way below average. that is reflected in the way of the migration pattern. there was a large migration from california but there was a big jump in the pandemic. the outflow from california, similarly there was a big inflow into florida prior to the pandemic. during the pandemic there was a big jump in people moving to florida. a 60% jump.

host: if you're more interested in the study, details, paragon institute.org. our first call comes from steve in pennsylvania on the independent line. you're on with the doctor. go ahead. caller: thanks for taking my call. thank you for c-span. ending the covid-19 pandemic truly irresponsible. at sometimes we have to do things we don't like because of the pressure we face from inside forces. host: dr., as far as the ending of these conversations, should there be a formal end to how we approach covid? guest: there should be a formal end to declarations and emergency measures.

one of the bad side effects about the emergency declarations and the biden administration's unwillingness to listen is now we have about 16 million more people on medicaid who are not eligible for it. states were barred from removing ineligible people because of the public health declaration. when that ends, states will be able to start taking those folks off who are no longer eligible. a variety of things that were done that need to be going back to normal. there are some things that we found that should be kept. you had a wonderful synergy of public, private partnerships that many should get vaccines produced in 10 months time. brand-new vaccines for a novel virus is unprecedented and unheard-of. we have to take that approach going forward with public health emergencies and make it easier

for new drugs and vaccines to come to market. those sorts of things encourage innovation. they make our health better and ultimately drive down the price of health care. host: from connecticut, tina, democrat line. caller: i was wondering with your study, did you look at the effects in different states. what would have happened in new york. the hospitals, i am interested to see if they would have been completely overrun. and as we went on with the pandemic whether we would have had a major problem with the medical services. guest: we didn't look specifically at hospital capacity.

the imperial model in london was a really imperial model. they did it because they failed to take account of people's voluntary avoidance behaviors. they said we are not going to include that in our modeling. they predicted there would be all sorts of fire and brimstone. in new york and in other places, hospitals were not overrun. things like the javits center was set up as an alternative medical facility sat mostly empty. the hospital ships that sailed into new york harbor sat mostly empty and unused. some of the things were overreactions. one could not necessarily know at the outset that would be the case. it is always wise to take precautions.

much of the modeling failed to take account of these various things. they also use things like unrealistic measures of covid infection mortality. they failed to account the disease changes over time. there were various problems with these models. the policymakers in washington and many at the state level failed to consider you have to balance the punitive health benefits of various models with the economic and educational and social aspects. they failed to account if you keep some of these places -- if you keep some of these things in place too long you are going to impact the economy, drug and alcohol abuse, lead to bad health effects by creating excess mortality from non-covert causes. all of these things are exactly

what we saw. they were protectable -- they were predictable but policymakers failed to balance that with the health effects. the health effects were nonexistent. host: we have a viewer off of our twitter feed. bill asking the question, "did florida make its decision based on relevant scientific information or was it a gamble that work out? " guest: there was little scientific information indicating severe and lockdown's be imposed. prior to the pandemic there were a variety of health organizations like the world health cdc, similar authorities in other countries in europe for example, that had pandemic plans. none of them called for this type of long, severe lockdown.

when you look back at the 1918 influenza plandemic -- influenza pandemic which killed about 60 million people worldwide, most come to the conclusion that the type of closure and lockdown measures were not going to be applicable in this situation in the pandemic we just endured. for a variety of reasons. no one was recommending the so-called science. no one was recommending that we keep these things in place forever. the imperial college was recommending we keep lockdown measures in place indefinitely until a vaccine was available. when they made that recommendation in march 2020, they couldn't know about nine or 10 months later we were going to have a vaccine. they were proposing we keep it in place for years. that would have been

unprecedented and disastrous. the states that relaxed it were going on the absence of science that would support prolonged measures. they were saying there is no reason not penalize our kids. there were other countries that did that. sweden, which was like florida in this country, was vilified for being too relaxed. ended up doing as well or better than most european countries. they never closed their schools and they never acquired masks in their schools. it is the absence of science supporting the lockdowns rather than science supporting opening up again. host: on our republican line from ohio, this is deborah. caller: good morning and thank you for taking my call. i am a microbiologist and i feel like we missed a tremendous opportunity in terms of general public health.

by not talking to people about the immune response and factors involving general health. diabetes in particular, we didn't explain to people the negative impact on your immune system. one of the things we do in the united states, for whatever reason, united states department of agriculture puts sugary soft drinks, candies, somewhere around 2000 and 8, 2009. inflammatory suits negatively impact the immune system. alcohol negatively impacts neutrophil at white blood cells, a major part of your immune system. it is not too late to start talking about specific behavior and how we can change that.

let's first take sugary soft drinks and candies off and start talking to american people about general health. host: thanks, caller. guest: what became clear relatively early on early in the pandemic is that there were certain groups much more vulnerable to becoming severely ill and dying from covid than others. that was primarily the elderly and also people of any age who had underlying health problems. that includes diabetes. and obesity. that is why in our study, we adjusted the health outcomes for each state's prevalence of diabetes and obesity so that we could take that into account. that was nona. it could have been better

publicized. but it certainly was known. what you had was the states that i think did better ended up focusing that protection, places like florida, countries like sweden, focusing their protection on the vulnerable group. these people with underlying conditions. host: this is darlene in las vegas, independent line. caller: good morning. the caller just use the word unprecedented a few calls back. a department of defense doctor was there for 33 years and is still a practicing physician. they were threatening to lose their license if they didn't push the vaccine, or if they even considered writing any type of exemption. people were quitting. doctors were committing suicide over this because they didn't

want to force this on their patients. government restrictions, threatening doctors with their licenses because they are not comfortable with what is being passed around and what they are told to do, or else. can you speak to that? guest: you have a piece of legislation in california which defines professional misconduct as spreading misinformation. i use that term advisedly. misinformation about covid and the vaccines. that is a horrible imposition on the patient relationship and the ability of physicians to look at unique circumstances of any situation. at some of these vaccine mandates have persisted far too long. they have ended up with us

losing potential workers like health-care workers, police officers, firefighters, people in the military. those people were fired. most of them have not been allowed back. and you now have severe shortages in some of those areas. it was a bad idea. we knew there were a lot of reasons to think -- not cutting back on deaths. there is no rationale, protecting coworkers from transmission. you are not even protecting yourself by enforcing a worker to have the vaccine. i am not saying you shouldn't be vaccinated. it is a good idea to protect yourself against disease and death. but to force people and end up with this shortage of essential

workers was a bad policy move. host: does the study suggest anything about the efficacy of mask mandates? guest: it doesn't directly. masks were one of the variables that the oxford researchers compiled. that was among the variables they considered. if we didn't specifically look at mask mandates, that is a part of the study. we don't have improvements in health. host: from cincinnati, ohio, wanita is next. a democrat line. caller: good morning trade i have a comment in question about the mandates. i don't know about your guest, but most of my members of my family who went to the meditech -- went to the military had to

take shots. they had to do it or they could not enter the service of the united states. the second thing is, i am 72 and i was one of the early ones. when i went to the university hospital, they had no clue. they didn't diagnose me having covid until i was out of the hospital after a six day stay two days after i had left. how did we lose a million people? mr. trump said that wouldn't happen, and we did. have a nice day. guest: for about 10 or 11 months we had no vaccine so there was no real protection. there were failures on both sides of the aisle. in the republican administration and, credit administration from

the public health front. at the outset of the pandemic, the fda and the cdc had a little bit of a fiasco in february 2020 when they wouldn't allow any tests for covid to be used in this country other than the cdc test. that cdc test was faulty. for the entire month of february, we didn't have good testing in this country. that may be picked -- that may be what happened in your case. the military, i agree with you. it is a different situation because the military you are relying on discipline, a command structure. people in the military should be obeying orders of their superior, unless there is something at the lead and morally wrong with them. that is a bit of a different situation if the military says you should take the vaccine. then you are obligated to take the vaccine.

what about schoolkids? what about teachers? what about fire fighters question mark what about police? -- what about fire fighters? what about police? when the vaccine became available, one could make the argument we should have health-care workers take the vaccine. at the beginning it looked like the vaccines were about 90% effective in cutting transmission. that would protect health-care workers and keep them from spreading the disease to the vulnerable patients they were taking care of. it became apparent very quickly that the transmission protection was dropping off after a short period of time. with each variant, transmission protection went down. now you are at relatively low level of protection. the rationale for a vaccine mandate is disappearing. host: you wrote in the report

another problem that was neither public health policymakers nor epidemiology models to advantage of was behavioral changes that would recur -- would occur regardless of economic policy. what do you mean by that? guest: this is a field of economic epidemiology that people respond to risk by taking risk avoid behavior. people began to take measures like staking -- like staying home. not going to work, avoiding crowded areas, not going into restaurants, for the government imposed these measures. whatever effect there was in terms of limiting the spread of covid was primarily reflect did, a result of voluntary measures people took, rather than the government measures. some of the modeling was way off in the sense they rigged the

results to make it look as if it was a result of government measures. people were taking these precautions away before the government imposed the measures. on the flipside of that, people have to be willing to comply with government measures to have any effect. when you keep some of those measures in effect way too long, people stopped adhering to them. host: from brad in minnesota, republican line. caller: good morning. i have got a couple of questions rated the first one, how we actually count covid deaths. people cannot grasp and understand what a covid death is an a covid related deaths is. you can be walking across the street, get hit by a car and if you have covid, it is a covid deaths.

the second, you are talking about forcing people to take something. the efficiency, effectiveness of the flu shot is 47%. so why would somebody go get this shot that doesn't stop you from getting or transmitting? guest: the reason you would get the shot, there is demonstrated effectiveness in keeping you from getting severely ill and from dying. that has persisted. the outset it looked as if these vaccines were about 90% effective in terms of cutting transmission. that has dropped off very quickly. about a month ago, dr. fauci published an article in scientific neuronal where he talked about the scientific

reasons that beforehand would have made you think these types of vaccines against a respiratory virus would not be very effective in cutting transmission. that is exactly what happened. he had good reason to think they would not be affected. he was also receiving data in real-time, showing the effectiveness was short-lived and dropping off with each successive variant. you have to wonder why he was pushing mandates well into the pandemic. well into 2021 and beyond. both for schoolkids and for the general population. host: from steve in mississippi, independent line. caller: good morning. there is a lot of criticism about what was done for the pandemic. they didn't know what they were

facing when it started. it turned out to be a terrible disease that killed over a million people. if people hadn't taken precautions, if they hadn't may be overreacted, how many more people would have died. we took the shots like we were supposed to and still got covid, but it was a milder case. they said it was part of it for the reasoning. when i hear this criticism of policy that wasn't written before they knew what they were facing, you have got to wonder, what else would you have done? guest: what one could have done is what was proposed in the great barrington declaration. focus protection on the people who were most vulnerable. that would mean the elderly, people with immuno deficiencies, pre-existing diseases that we talked about before.

diabetes, for example. that was not done. it states like new york and some other states were forbidding nursing homes from testing people who were coming out of hospitals to see if they had covid. you were putting people into covid into nursing homes. you had a large number of deaths in nursing homes. you needed to focus your protection on that nursing home population. which is what places like florida begin to do and places like sweden began to do. you always have counterfactual's. it is always hard to know what would have happened. the data shows these measures, severe and prolonged lockdown measures had little or no impact on health. we would have been much better off having focused early protection measures on the people we knew were most vulnerable.

the death rate for people under 20 years old is minuscule. they form about a 10% of total deaths in this country. whereas you have 1000 times that death rate when you going to people 70 years and older. that is where we need to focus our attention. it undoubtably has kept people from dying. it is a tremendous accomplishment that operation warp speed was able to, -- a few month later we had a pandemic.

we didn't know that was going to happen. we knew it would happen eventually. we knew it would happen in a few months. that was what operation works be would -- work speed was. unprecedented, rapid development of vaccines grade vaccines normally take about 10 years, this was done in 10 months. host: the new york times takes a look at overall cases of covid. 7.4 million cases in florida with 85,000 plus deaths. in california, 103,000 deaths. how do those numbers compare to the other states. are they higher than the other states? guest: florida's health outcomes and what we measured as health outcomes, florida's health outcomes are about the same as

california's health outcomes. there is no difference despite the different approaches they took to lockdown measures. a state like new york, which was near the bottom in terms of health outcome measures, despite its very severe lockdown measures, it is number one on that oxford severity index. it had some of the most severe and prolonged measures in the country. yet it did very poorly in health outcomes. host: from linda, democrats line in st. louis. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i am thankful for the next -- i am thankful for the vaccine. i have six siblings. only one of us, he lives out of state and did not adhere to anything, he is the only one who contracted covid. there were times i thought americans were really acting poorly. parents want their little kids to be sitting in the classroom so they can see their smiles.

but when you have a teacher and she has kids from all over and you don't know what is going on in their homes, i thought that was very selfish. we all took precautions at that time. i am thankful. thank you. guest: no question the vaccines have played an important role in protecting the health of the nation. however, i would say the vaccine studies have not been done for kids. some of these vaccines were approved, particularly boosters for kids were approved without any real studies. we are only starting to get those studies now. there is an argument to be made that when you have a population that has extraordinarily low incidence of side effects, excuse me, severe disease and death, maybe they don't need it

necessarily to be forced to take the vaccine. i can understand why a parent might be concerned about a brand-new vaccine. to force them and keep their kids out of school, adding to the tremendous education loss that we see in the country that resulted from prolonged closure of in person education, it is wrong. it has to be thought of very carefully. have to be willing to balance the benefits of a policy with the side effects of the policy. that has been a failure throughout the pandemic that policymakers have been unwilling to consider some of these side effects. with the result that you have tremendous economic problems and tremendous education problems. the decline in test scores is somewhere between a half a year and a years worth of education. a lot of people are predicting

that will never be recovered for many were -- for many communities. the communities that will hurt the most by these economic outcomes, education outcomes were the poor and disadvantaged communities that were in the worst position to start. they were least able to adjust. least able to compensate. to say this was somehow wrong to question these policies is misguided. host: the white house reporting today considering a missed plans to wind down on the pandemic to keep vaccines treatment no charge for the uninsured going forward. what do you think of that as a strategy? guest: the problem with what the white house is doing, they keep buying vaccines. at the moment they are buying vaccines no one wants to use. they bought over 100 million doses of the vaccine, most of --

most of which have gone unused. only about 15% have taken that booster. and they announced recently they are going to be buying more of the nova vaccine which is a different mechanism, different technology for manufacturing. it is manufacturing against the original strain of the vaccine. even though this was received in a in august, over 100,000 doses have been administered. but they are buying more. at some point we have to try to return to a normal situation where you have a market mechanism that reflects what people are interested in doing in the demand for the vaccine. simply buying up a big supply like in a field of dreams type situation, hoping they will come, then having to throw out the vaccines is a poor public policy and a waste of money. host: missouri, republican line,

clifton is next. caller: all of my friends got sick over the shot. a lot have died. this was a planned attack by the chinese government to kill us. and our government knew. most of the covid deaths in this country was caused by the shots. they should be banned immediately. host: dr., you probably heard those type of theories during the course of covid. what is your response to that? guest: most of the deaths from covid occurred prior to the vaccine being available. there is no proof of what the gentleman said. host: we will go to don, in florida, democrats line. caller: hello, good morning.

i have a couple of questions for you. pedro, you bring this gentleman on and you ask him who his organization was and who sponsored him. we heard him say many individuals and a couple of organizations. to me, that is no answer at all. having your top three donors and organizations backing you. guest: we are funded by a variety of individuals and organizations. our research endeavor is completely independent of those donors. no donor dictates to us what research we should do. no donor reviews our stoner -- our studies. no donor reviews the results. our scholars are relying on the data and their academic backgrounds and credentials to do the studies grade there is no influence by any donor on any of the studies grade host: -- any of the studies. host: has the study been

reviewed by any outside sources? guest: we send it around to some experts to get comments and suggestions. there were four authors on the paper. three of them are phd economists. two of them are physicians. myself and eric's son who is also a physician and phd economists. we were able to send it around and get comments and feedback before we released it. host: one more call from don in new mexico. caller: i just reviewed deaths per hundred thousand population of february 2, 2023. the state with the highest deaths per population was arizona with 452. the state with the lowest is hawaii it with 127.

you have that log from florida, it has 395 deaths per hundred thousand population. your head 193 deaths per hundred per capita -- per population. california had 254 deaths per hundred thousand population. that means florida had 140 one deaths per hundred thousand population. the other comment i would like to make, covid deaths in the united states are running 428. it will be the third leading cause of death in the united states. i would suggest anyone listening to this program should tune into dr. michael oser home from the center of international study of diseases. he has a podcast every thursday. if you want accurate information

i would suggest you go with him. host: that is don in new mexico. guest: i don't know what source the caller is looking at. i suspect that he like many others is looking at raw death figures. because we know there is a strong association between advancing age and death from covid, you have to adjust for the state age distribution. you have a state like florida which is the second oldest population in the country, a state like california which has one of the youngest populations in the country, you have to adjust for that fact. that is what we did in our study. many of the studies, probably the one the caller isthey are tw figures which are completely misleading. when you adjust for the age of the state, when you adjust for the prevalence of the underlying conditions, again, they differ from state to