>> schieffer: today on face the nation from the clinton global initiative in new york, an interview with bill clinton. >> the republican argument against the president's reelection was actually pretty simple. pretty snappy. it went something like this. we left it a total mess. he hasn't cleaned it up fast enough so fire him and put us back in. >> schieffer: he was the star of the detrimentally convention and the president couldn't have been happier. >> e-mailed me after his speech and said you need to appoint him secretary of explaining stuff. >> schieffer: we will ask him where he thinks the race stands today and what whoever is elected president can do to break the washington gridlock. then we will turn to a powerhouse round table for analysis. peggy noonan of the wall street journal, david corn of mother jones magazine, the reporter who

broke the story of mitt romney and that secret video. >> 47 percent of the people who vote for the president, all right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who rely on government, who believe they are victims. >> schieffer: david gergen who worked for president clinton and ronald reagan, time magazine editor richard stengel, and cbs news political director john dickerson. we are in the buying apple and this is face the captioning sponsored by cbs >> and now from new york, face the nation with bob schieffer. >> schieffer: good morning again and wnl welcome to face the nation. former president bill clinton, we are here at the clinton global initiative in new york, mr. president, this has become an important event. you bring together world leaders, philanthropists presidential candidates, people with ideas, time magazine said this week it has become kind of

an ebay of philanthropy, where you put together people with needs, bring them together with people who have money and the means to resolve their problems, whether it is poverty, disease, just improving their daily lives, you get everybody in one place, and go at it from there. what do you hope to accomplish at this meeting? >> i hope to help people design their philanthropy and fit their partners in a way that gives them better and quicker results. i mean, all along we have been trying to answer the how question, how do you do things faster, cheaper, better? how can these nongovernmental groups working with business and working with government and working with others, like a group in the congo works for a group in america, and works for the international community, how can they create networks that actually produce the results

they want. and it occurred to us that this whole movement in american business to design what you are going to do in, and advance better might work in this area, so we decided to organize everything we are doing and, in clean energy and education and healthcare and our special focus on women and girls with that focus. i think it is going to produce some very interesting, specific commitments. >> schieffer: and you have got a very interesting group of people here coming. >> yeah, we have got president obama and governor romney. we have got the president of egypt is going to close for us, and i think people will find that very interesting. president, new president of liberia is coming. nobel prize winning president -- i said liberia, i meant libya, and the nobel prize winning president of liberia is coming and a lot of other world leaders

from around the world. >> mike duke will be on the opening, president of wal-mart along with the head of the world bank and secretary-general of the u.n. because of at least among american companies wal-mart is the number one user of solar power in america and they use quite a bit of wind too, so it is very interesting that they have, a buying part of their business strategy and their stock has been up and growth is good, it is cutting down on their traditional energy use. >> schieffer: i want to wish you the best of luck with this but also want to talk to you a little bit about american politics. you have clearly were the star of the detrimentally convention. you probably made the best case that anybody could probably make for your side. let's just talk about what is going on in the campaign right now. the buying topic this week was this video that mitt romney, that came to light, which he more or less said he was writing off 47 percent of the

electorate, who paid no independent, income tax, relied on the government, refused to take responsibility for their lives, do you think that was smart politics? >> no. but it is interesting. you know, i know a lot of higher income people, a lot of whom helped me do my work and they are supporting governor romney and a lot of people say things like that but i think it is worth pointing out if you look at that 47 percent, first they do pay taxes. they pay social security taxes, they pay medicare taxes, state and local taxes. second, they are out of the federal income tax pool for two reasons. one is, the economic crash, which lowered a lot of people's incomes, even a lot of the newer jobs don't pay high incomes. now the second reason is interesting. it is a bipartisan reason in the past. is because the combined impacts

of the earned income tax credit and the child tax credit, i doubled the earned income tax credit which i think president ford signed into law and which president reagan supported and it is refundable if you work and got kids and your income is low, the government will actually refund the credit if you drop out of owing income tax. it was designed to support working families. then we put in a child tax credit which when president bush passed all of those tax cuts, that is what he did for middle class people. he doubled the child tax credit to $1,000. then when president obama came in and we had a democratic congress, and the economy is reeling, they increased the earned income tax credit so you could get a little more if you had more than three kids. so an enormous number of these people who were dropped out, were dropped out for reasons of work and family, not defebruary dependence, they are working their heart out, they would love to make enough money to pay

federal tax. we were all before trying to help them with their work and with their child rearing. >> schieffer: well, do you think governor romney understood who he was talking about when he made this statement? >> i don't know, because, you know, the primary they ran kept pushing them all to the right, i remember when they all raised their hand and said would you oppose the budget, a new budget if it has $10 in spending cuts for every 1 dollar in tax increase, and every one of them said yes, i would be against that, so they got pushed further and further and further out there, and i think, you know, you don't just purge all of that out of your system when you start running for the general election. >> schieffer:, you know, the fact of the matter is, though, that government assistance has increased tremendously. don't you think that the governor rom friday i, romney has a point when he says the government has just gotten too

buying? >> i think that, i think we have to wit wait until normal growth resumes to make that judgment, that is, of the 33 countries in the organization for economic cooperation and development, basically, bigger, richer countries, we are .. 31st out of 33 in the percentage of income we pay in taxes, and we have been 25th out of 33 in the percentage of government spending we have, that is just because of the collapse. in other words, a heck of a lot of this money is unemployment and food stamps and medicaid for people who lost their private health insurance and 2009, in the depths of the rerecession, insurance profits went up, 5 million people lost their health insurance, three and a half million went on medicaid, working people, so i think when -- after normal growth resumes we will have a better feeling. my hunch is that the number of people depending on the government will go way, way

down, once we have got an economy that functioning again. >> schieffer: where do you think this election is right now? >> i think that the president is winning, and winning in the swing states. i think that the republican super pacs and the romney campaign combined will out spend the democrats probably two and a half, three to one here on in and i think this is the only time i can remember when a lot of the national polls are closer than the polls in the so-called swing states, that is because the obama campaign doesn't have as much money so they have to concentrate that in the swing states and we are doing pretty well. so i think -- i think, assuming the debates are even a draw i think the president will win, but i think you can't know because of the enormous financial advantage that is set,

that gave to the republicans super pacs and because of the work they have done and will do on election day to try to reduce the number of young people, first generation immigrants and minorities voting, they have worked hard at this, they have a theory that if the election, the people who vote in 2012 look more like the 2010 electorate, then the folks that elected the president in the first place in 2008, they get enough of those folks to stay home they can still win so that's why we have to keep working at it. >> schieffer: you know, the fact is, and you have made as i said, you probably made as good -- made the case as good as anybody could make it for president obama, but the fact is, unemployment is up. it is higher than when he came to office, the economy is still in the dump. some people say that is reason enough to make a change. >> it is if you believe that we

could have been fully healed in four years. i don't know a single serious economist who believes that as much damage as we had could have been healed. we were losing 700, $800,000 a jobs a month when he took office so you really have to look at it when the economy bottomed out in about six months after he took office, and we lost jobs for the first year while his programs were beginning to kick in. since then, his jobs record has actually, is actually better, particularly private jobs record than in the previous eight years under the bush administration. so my belief is that his approach is more likely to lift americans up and to build a modern economy we need and to bring back the middle class and i don't think there is any evidence that this sort of militant anti-government deal will work. i also think that if they enact

$5 trillion more of tax cuts we will never get out of this debt hole and when the interest rates start to rise, as they will when the economy grows, we are going to be in a world of hurt. so i think that the obama approach is better. it is more likely to produce broad based prosperity than romney's and i think that people will see that unless they believe that somehow magically somebody could have brought us back to full employment in four years. i just don't believe it could have happened. >> schieffer: mr. romney released his income taxes for last year this week. do you think he has given enough information? >> well, it would be interesting to know, you know, i think some people just -- i think john mccain only gave two years but he did make senate reports before that. i think we gave ten years or something like that. that is really up to voters.

they can decide. but in the last two years he wouldn't have any ordinary income, which would mean that most of his income would be capital gains as it is and they would be taxed at 15 percent which is what the law is, and gave a lot to charity which is commendable, including to his church which is commendable, but it would be interesting i think for the american people to see how the ordinary income years were treated, but apparently we are not going to get to see that so the voters will just have to make up their mind. >> schieffer: what did you make up of this that he didn't take all of the charitable deductions that he could have taken? now for the next -- he has the right over the next three years to refile and claim those deductions but he didn't take them and i guess if h he hd taken all of those deductions he would have been paid at a rate of about ten percent, something like that. >> yes, apparently they wanted to keep it at 13, 14 percent,

but that is -- i don't know what to say about that. i think it is what it is. but i think he shouldn't apologize for his charitable deductions, that is a good thing, but i don't think we can get out of this hole we are in if people at that income level only pay, 13, 14 percent. and so we will just see what happens, but i think apparently he is not going to release anymore income tax returns and the voters will just have to make their judgments about that. >> schieffer: all right. mr. president we are going to take a break here and come right back in one minute.

>> schieffer:. >> president, the congress is adjourned again until after the election. the best i can tell the only thing they did was pass a continuing resolution to keep the government from shutting down. there seems to be no end to this gridlock now. it was tough while you were there over the last couple of years, nothing seems to get done. it seems to me that is one of

the issues here. president obama has been unable to get them to do anything. mitt romney says he knows how to get them to do something. what is it going to take to break this gridlock? >> well, i think the election will have a lot to do with it. we only had one really inactive year when i was president, that was 1995, after the gingrich congress came in, that sort of pretea party, tea party congress and not much happened and two government shutdowns, public had a very negative reaction to it so even in a presidential year we got a lot done in '96 and even with all of the troubles that we had in the second term we had 99 and 2000 were extremely productive years, so something has to change so that both parties see that they have more to gain from doing than not doing. and i think what will happen is when the election occurs, let's say the president wins, i believe he will.

if he wins, then he can't run again, the calculus of the congress will change, they will be facing this fiscal year and doing exactly what it was intended to do. it will force them to concentrate and i believe there will be a lame duck session of congress in which they will either reach the beginnings of a budget deal or more likely agree to some sort of period of time to avoid the fiscal cliff and make the budget deal then. i think that as soon as this election is over, the incentives for gridlock will go way down and the incentives for action will go way up, plus you have got not just a fiscal cliff, we need to get the economy going again, if his jobs program had passed we would have another 700,000 to a million jobs. but that won't be enough unless we also reach a ten year budget agreement that will hold interest rates down when the economy starts to grow, when the

economy starts to grow and people start borrowing money again, banks start loaning money to small businesses and not just buying ones, interest rates will go up, because there will be more competition for money. if interest rates were the same today as they were when i was president, the payment on the debt, that is what the taxpayers have to pay every year, the financial debt would go from $250 billion, they can't let that happen. if they adopt the american plan now and a ten year budget plan, then i think it will lead to an economic boon and accelerate economic growth and keep interest rates in balance. >> schieffer: mr. president i have to ask you about your wife. is he is getting ready to wind up her term as secretary of state. do you think she will run for president next time out? a lot of people think she ought to if barack obama is reelected. >> i don't know. you know, she has worked hard for 20 years.

we had eight years in the white house and ran for senate. she served in new york for eight years and then she immediately became secretary of state. and she is tired. she really worked hard. i think she has done a fabulous job and i am proud of her, but she wants to take some time off, kind of regroup, write a book, i hope it will be working together, she was doing this work long before i was, and a lot of what we do now in women and girls were driven by some of the shings they started in the things she started in the state department so i think we should give her a chance to organize her life and decide what she wants to do. i just don't know. she is an extraordinarily able person, i never met anybody i thought was a better public servant but i i i have no earthy idea what she will decide to do. >> schieffer: do you think she would be the most qualified person to run? >> i never met anybody i thought was any better than her at this,

but, again, we have got a lot of able people in our party who want to be president. there is never a shortage of people who want to be president. we have a lot of bright young governors, we have a lot of other people who will probably run out of the congress. we won't have to worry about people wanting to be president next time who are good people, but i just think, you know, as the decision she will have to make, but whatever she does i am for her first, last and always. he is the ablest, i know i am biased but i think she demonstrated as senator and as secretary of state that she has extraordinary ability, a lot of common sense, a lot of, you know, stick to itiveness and push a rock up a hill as long as it takes to get it up the hill. >> and if she decided to do it you would be right there to help her. >> whatever she wanted me to do, i would, who knows. it is her decision and her life, but whatever she decides i will

support it. >> schieffer:. >> schieffer: i am going to go back to one thing you said back there at one point that you thought with this economy being in the shape it is that it might be necessary temporarily to extend the bush tax cuts. do you still feel that way? for everybody. >> well, what i -- but i did say that back in 2010 when i supported the president's decision to do it. what they heed to do now is avoid the fiscal cliff and make a long-term deal. i understand the president's reluctance to extend a tax cuts for upper income people again, have a lot to do with the calendar, the timing, when you had all of those republican candidates for president saying they would oppose a budget deal that had $10 in tax cut spending, excuse me, spending cuts for every 1 dollar in tax increases, that won't work.

nobody thinks it will work, you can't get this budget deal, the simpson-bowles commission said you can't bring the debt doubt without three things, economic growth, spending restraint and some revenues. a balanced approach. i think that is what he wants. that is what i support. i don't think that he can give that if he gives away one leg of the three legged stool before the negotiations even start .. that is really what is going on here. >> so if he had to do that just temporarily, you would -- he would do that? >> no, i think -- i don't know what they are going to do to avoid the fiscal cliff. but if you look at what senator durbin is shopping around, he would basically, basically saying we are going to avoid the fiscal cliff for six months and have a deal within six months. that is different sort of thing. but for him to agree to take

that out and say okay you can extend this for another year, to do that one more time would put him in a very disadvantages you position and make it impossible for us to get a reasonable budget deal. i should say that most of the republicans i know who would have to pay higher taxes agree that they should, if it is part of a budget deal. they just want it to be part of a long-term budget deal where they see it is a balanced plan that will do something about the debt. >> schieffer: mr. president, i want to thank you very much for being with us. it is always fun to interview you and we will be back in just a minute. >> force face the nation is sponsored by natural gas alliance, modern power today.

>> schieffer: watching our candidates struggle with statements that were supposed to be private and sudden think became public, barack obama got burned last time, mitt romney this time. i offer the following guide to all candidates of the digital age. one, never say anything you wouldn't want to see on the front page of the washington post. two, there is no such thing as a private party, actually, there is no longer any such thing as privacy, that ended with the coming of social media. everyone has a camera and a recorder and their own rules for using them. three, when you speak to a group, don't expect everyone to keep what you say in confidence. no one is universally loved. the last person to get 100 percent of the vote was saddam hussein. look what happened to him. four. if you don't want your words to become public, be quiet. like suspects in a criminal case, all of us, including candidates, have the right to

remain silent. and finally, and this has nothing to do with cameras and recorders, when you are talking to rich folks about poor folks, be careful. it never seems to come out quite right. as herman melville bro in harpers magazine in 1854 of all of the preposterous assumptions of humanity over humanity, nothing exceeds most of the criticism made on the habits of the poor by the well housed, the well warmed and the well-fed. back in a minute.

>> schieffer: some of our stations are leaving us now. for most of you we will be back with an all-star political panel, including peggy noonan a reporter that uncovered that video of mitt romney, david corn of mother jones, former clinton and reagan advisor, david gergen, time magazine editor, rick stengel, and our own john dickerson. stay with us. ,,,,,,,,,,