. >> john spratt? >> when you take off -- when you take on the tax code, and the spending code and entitlements, medicare, medicaid, social security, and defense, you're going to see special interests form on capitol hill. it's extremely important that if we move forward, the country moves with us, and we've yet to do the job i think to explain to them what's at stake and what it's going to mean to the average american taxpayer. we need to galvanize. there's a sentiment that is strongly concerned. dave would tell you the same thing about oklahoma. people are concerned about debt, and they can compare their own debt-laden situation with the government's debt-laden situation and what's happening to each other is of great concern to them, no question that they have a great deal of concern, they're not ready yet for whether the state can resolve its problem. it took us four different multiyear budget plans, between the balanced budget agreement of 1997, to bring the balance in the reagan-bush years, bring

. >> dave mccurdy then john spratt, two former members of congress. what is your take? >> we have to go big because i do not think there is an alternative. to do that, we sold two things. one coming you provide economic certainty and a roadmap to the future for both the job growth and foreign industry to invest. you also have a chance to restore confidence. the political system and there is absolutely none today. the irony, and i think erskine said it properly, is that there is a better opportunity to go big and better comprehensive than there is to go small. everyone has to have skin in the game and it seen as being part of the solution. in our experience, that is the only way you can have a big move like this. the business sector want predictability, certainty, a level playing field, but they also want to see congress and the administration rise above partisanship and provide solutions. the biggest fear i have, and it has changed a lot in this town, is probably because of digital technology, media, and the rhetoric, but we're losing our capacity for strategic thinking

i was there, so was john spratt, so was dave mccreedty, we were there, and i made the tough vote -- i don't know how dave voted or john did -- for the clinton budget in 1993, my first term, which was a career-threatening move. i came back to congress by a margin of 800 votes out of 225,000 cast, and most of the women elected with me in '92 to open seats lost their elections, march jolie mar goal lis was the poster woman for this. i also was one of the hearty little band of 40 in the penny kasich conspiracy. twenty democrats and twenty republicans where we proposed to cut $100 billion from the budget, and we came within four votes of getting that past. in today's term it would be substantially larger. against the objections of the white house and most moving parts of the then-clinton administration. and i also, of course, was part of a large bipartisan group to vote to balance the budget in 1997. that was only 14 years ago, folks. and look what happened. it's a question of are we big enough or are our elected leaders big enough to do this? they used to be bigger. and something happened