The State of Things; Erskine Bowles

it's been the post fb this is the state of things i'm going to the us senate race here in north carolina this year could have national

implications democratic senator john edwards is vacating a seat and republicans see an opportunity to enhance their majority in the us senate in our continuing conversations with the us senate candidates this hour we're talking with the democrat erskine bowles after years as an investment banker in charlotte bowl served for two years as president clinton's chief of staff here indirectly haitian there's a plain speaking manager and earned respect on both sides of the aisle the senate run is only erskine bowles second try for public office in his first attempt two years ago he lost another senate race to elizabeth dole so what are the issues that'll mark this year's race the loss of manufacturing jobs tobacco buyout war in iraq coming up this hour we'll talk with democratic senate hopeful erskine bowles and we'll hear your questions the

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this is the state of things i melinda pan caught up in november north carolinians will choose a new us senator that's because democrat john edwards in the race for the presidential nomination is vacating his seat and the banks north carolina one of several states where democratic senators are not running for re election now in this republicans see an opportunity to increase their power in the us senate and the race in north carolina is one that's being watched closely the two men likely to mean the us senate race here are republican congressman richard burr who we interviewed a few months ago and democrat erskine bowles who is with us today before he ran for the us senate in two thousand to erskine bowles did not consider himself a politician he had spent decades as a successful

investment banker and charlotte before working as a campaign fundraiser for bill clinton and then erskine bowles went on to head the small business administration before joining the white house's deputy chief of staff and then eventually as chief of staff erskine bowles return to the private sector in nineteen ninety eight and resisted seeking office himself until september eleventh two thousand one after that day he shrugged off a personal discomfort with politics and decided to run for the us senate he lost to elizabeth dole two thousand to senate race but last fall erskine bowles decided to make a run for the senate again and he joins us today to talk about the race and his views on key issues welcome erskine bowles well we welcome your calls this hour as well if you log onto our talk with erskine bowles about the issues are numbers one eight seven seven nine sixty nine eight six two that still three one seven seven nine six to nine eight six to well the question we asked richard burr when he was here a few months ago an all star of asking you what is the

issue of most importance in north carolina that you know they should campaign i don't think there's any question that at its jobs you can see it you can feel it everywhere you travel it's not you know that the statistics show that a hundred and forty thousand north carolinians have lost a job thousands more have lost their health care insurance but when you travel around the state in you meet people and see the faces and you hear him tell the stories about unity to people who have worked hard all their life played by the rules and it had to go home one night until their family support you i it's clearly the biggest issue we have a north carolina day we're very heavy manufacturing state we lost lots of jobs economists had a tough time and there are lots of steps ugly will take inordinate economy mountford know the devil's in the details what would you do to have to turn around to stop a staunch the losses a chance to make a lot of raise a lot that you need to do that i think

my thirty five years in the business world helps me understand a half you know what works in business and what doesn't work out an enormous success as i've had some failures i think you learn from both i think i understand where government can help and we're just playing on and get out of the way and will in what way to the government get out of the way you think is at the example of thing that didn't work i think you can it's better probably take all of this in context and try to talk about it you know if you let me out all things are they going to do to get the economy moving for what i think one of the ways it some of some of the government regulation some of it says by gorgeous record is the way the government needs to get underway but again i think the most important things we gotta have some sensible trade policy in this country we really desperately need this and you know we we gotta stop this one way trade we got open up for markets to our goods and we protect a lot of focus on china china really is a big problem today

and there are number steps we need to take we need to force beyond afloat today's paper the dollar is the chinese manufacturers or forty percent or official price advantage against are many factors they had to recommend direct subsidies to their manufacturing facilities which again gives him an artificial advantage and to top things off right now above tran shipping about as example in the texans do about four billion dollars in goods which are legally made in china they are she up to the league to mexico and then very vaguely trenchant appear in lent if you divide four billion by twenty million dollars for a plant that two hundred text a plan to close down as a direct result of these illegal trench and so i believe we gotta have we got a really crack down on this narrow on trade we gotta get tough on trade and i've said unequivocally i'm not support any future trade agreements until we start enforcing to what we have on the books today betrayed only one part of get this economy moving forward are several the things we have got to do

north carolina is a state as almost as our nation is of small businesses and we got help small businesses grow create jobs and only three got it capped a land to small businesses we gotta give him advice they need we gotta get those in the research triangle park in other areas of north carolina become a researched alternate their way to do that we got up our provider and manufacturing companies in a state or some kind of tax credits to keep jobs here as opposed to taking them overseas we got invested infrastructure remains water sewer natural gas roads a high speed broadband access access to the internet we got invested skills i've often said i can have the most highly advanced high tech product on the factory floor but the people who work for we don't have the skills necessary to operate i wasted no money when we got a you know we're honest we still this is a heavy agribusiness state you know what his lab is people in the states to work in agribusiness would

get sixty billion dollars to our state economy we have got a really focus on how can we help our farmers the number one thing we can do if we can get the tobacco buyout done it it will kick over six billion dollars into the economy of north carolina and as a backup by you're talking about here is the one where the government in some roller other is going to pay the people who are tobacco farmers now who have the allotments allows them to grow x amount of tobacco and sell x amount of tobacco in a year and there are a couple of different tobacco buyout plants know you support one that would also have to fund understand correctly on that the fda would then have some oversight over tobacco is that i support the truth there is a bill nelson sponsored by our cars when fletcher is now the governor of kentucky but arthur fletcher macintyre an average girl from north carolina and there's a companion bill that's smarter about senator dole is senator mcconnell are support both of those bills both of them call for about of aden for are the only ways florida is

made a doll's for the tobacco former ford also record or steely for health record or they'd offer them back for its but i think that vicki to to making it work to getting the votes we need for is to make sure that we also is gonna have to come whether you like government regulation or not and i'm a business guy about a crazy about him but it's here to get the votes done you're gonna have to have fda regulation on cigarettes that's only way you get the healthcare community to support it and you'll have to get those votes from healthcare community needed a dark i think what i'm good at is bringing people together and fighting these commonsense solution to these really tough deals and therefore i think that would have to do to get the fifty one votes you need to make it happen it's been a tough elizabeth dole has described the issue is radioactive and i think he's done a good job and work in fort you just need some real help to get it through i remember when i went back to washington to be chief of staff for the president announced a worthy of bringing me back to balance the federal budget no by the world believed it could be done but i brought both of those

sides together outspent you know tons and tons of time locked up with newt gingrich in florida will withdraw senator lott and that was an easy a beloved boss and i'll say well also was nice to be locked up with we dig up our gaza tuesday to really far apart but we found a common ground you know we did bring people together we did balance at federal budget and i think we did get seventy five percent of the members and both parties in both the house and senate to vote yes i think there is a deal they are laid on the ground it is critically important to our tobacco farmers that we get this done and not just of the farmers but to their communities yet tonight to either their talents to that because of the money will kick in to hospitals and kick into the fire to farmers to the police department to the school's mean this is a critically important issue and with if we don't do it you know our tobacco farmers now i cannot stand another devastating around quote cuts but i think it's i think it's fair to say that our domestic tobacco cannot

pay the rent they have to pay a quota holders and continue to compete with all this foreign tobacco common in because the idea is that once you get rid of the allotments the quotas they're at then it becomes a market driven economy for tobacco leaf growing it there's no guarantee that you're gonna get the money that you've been getting now with the allotment system in the quota system we're talking with erskine bowles who is the democratic hopeful for the us senate here in north carolina and we welcome your calls our number is one eight seven seven nine six to nine eight sixty let's start with brining wake forest have arrived i woke up in a locker room with film that i knew i wanted to address something that was sort of a frustration line in the last campaign reporter jordan of the land there seem to be oklahoma from being made in politics and i think you shot history of standing up and saying we have hard choices we have to make

political problem resolved rhee buried with her like she was a world reduced taxes cutting pork barrel spending or promotion if they refuse to put their local projects here in north carolina that it will push for corporate were pulled pork and i'm real frustrated to be honest that i do and we would like you to come out like this is of course albright thank you for voting for me i appreciate it and i sure you've been locked out with the people he was semi out when you're trying to get to a sensible compromise it's good for the american people is never easy whether it's people on the right and left you know i'm i had i didn't i'm not a negative person and therefore i didn't want to spend a lot of time attacking his dole on every everything apart

possibly could've and again i think she's done as good a job as she serves as busy canon wasn't he served as great buildings she certainly cares a lot again i felt like it was basie go replicate that it was very difficult to reduce taxes increase spending and think that you're ever gonna be able to bounce a budget i don't think in a family please take to do that sort of my dad always taught me are not the over promise but to do what you say you're going to do it so i think it's very difficult sometimes a political campaign to do that we'll get back to more with erskine bowles in a moment here on the state of things for for the state of things comes from the corporation for public broadcasting it

this is the state of things i'm linda uncommon our guest today is democratic us senate candidate erskine bowles who was chief of staff under president bill clinton from nineteen ninety six to nineteen ninety eight we are taking your calls are numbers one eight seven seven nine sixty nine eight six two and erskine bowles the first time he ran for office was two years ago for the us senate and as our caller just before the break i was asking you why you didn't go there to challenge elizabeth dole who is your republican opponent and who won the race when she challenger more and i've seen it said about your race last time around that you are you're a reluctant politician might get into the fray at all that because i really think i could make a difference it is not just the allude every time a guy can make a big difference i think what we need in washington is people who can bring people together to find these common sense real world solutions we we got to relate tough problems in north carolina today and you know i've said over and over again i don't care if a bill

sponsored by a republican or a democrat it is good for north carolina that how we got there in ottawa just they'll support i wanna fight for and get it done i think we need people who are willing to go there and sometimes put partisan politics aside and really do what's right for this country and write for north carolina and and that's what i am determined to do and i think that's were proven in a thirty five year business career and in the public service was working for the juvenile diabetes foundation or work in my community and what i've what my skill is is bring in as people gather i'm not really good at wages she says just not what my strength is what must recuse is given to us finding that right solution and we got tough problem here that burst in polls is our guest the self you want to join the conversation or number toll free one eight seven seven nine six to ninety six two and frank is on the line from greensboro hi frank good morning vali

says thank you so much or by clay about gershwin edwards is very hard for both you don't want to improve our government you have financial problems in the clinton administration and no doubt when you give a much needed help balance the budget yes my question that it's a searchable is out what will be your solution to be a great number of latino and let's look at the workplace we americans and literally holes in them to lose their jobs because of water sochi i don't know what the answer is mr malloy well for your for the last year and gave his jobs directly with placed

the call of the health benefits of instruments playing and because of our salary i'm not this is not a forward to solve the problem of labeling and more jobs center what is your position on the immigration policy that president bush was there recently recommending are there's one good aspect of it that i think is we're pouring out and that is you know we do have a million people in this country and we don't know where they are who they are and for national security reasons i think it makes a lot of sense to her to know where we are who we are are and based on what i've read about it and of course i haven't seen it fleshed out in the devil's always in the details i could not support it yeah and i could support because i think it would lead just is just as frank said to the to the loss of a lot of american jobs let me given example are if he attacks or plant located here and it's pay an

eighteen dollars an hour plus benefits so it's all and called for twenty four twenty five dollars an hour and they decide ok are gotten too expensive you know towards me to compete on a global basis to pay that and on one or more close as planned an animal go right next door and open up a plan and we'll play minimum wage by five fifteen hour or maybe were being tailed book it had more deaths six sixty thousand hour michael pay benefits and they go out and hire a bunch of love love of undocumented workers to come work there and they can say gosh they know americans apply for those jobs because it would a platform because you can't raise a family on that amount of money and so they can get away with taking those jobs in essence is when they're not problem losing jobs to the foreign countries today i think rather than given him too this immigration policy that the

administration talk about so i would oppose the problem exists because there have been millions of people who had come into the us undocumented illegal immigrants they are here now what gets done what i mean are they sent packing back back to where they came from if it's determined that they're there without paperwork i think again go into french point i think you could have some kind of earned legalization program over a period term i'll wear you know for people who had been here who had paid taxes to head you know not broken in a lawless who had learned english you had you know taken some civics course is kid could go into what's called a what i would call an earned legalization vermont think something like that could make sense erskine bowles as our guest today he is the democratic hopeful for the us senate seat that john edwards is vacating and in his run for the democratic presidential nomination jesse is with us from raleigh either jessi very good at

them alm says requiring telecom and flesh question arm of howard dean for poorer we've built a really strong grassroots network you're not going on all across the country really a man i really think the first impulse is to reach out to the grassroots and try to get low you get out to help him with the campaign were we prefer the minority that way out of the right now that we're going to the gov and work toward democratic causes we saw yesterday for example we start made stove made postcard to find out people to get them to come out or they are caught you're on the meetings that are coming up on march ninth the author of the dorm can record for europe all right was there is there an issue that you would want to hear is google's address that would reach out to the gross marler grassroots and

understand what you mean basically you know where i thought i don't know i don't know for a bold and if we agree on everything but if we can afford to live within think basically what i play which they cannot afford to have infinite faith as <unk> agree with the involvement of a funny thing but we certainly think it's all of those things you appreciated hears it all the time i agree with you god has been a lot of taboo reaching out to the grassroots and that's why i've spent the vast majority of the early part of this campaign going to all of those counties west of the asphalt which some people forget our port in north carolina and eight or a big part of our cultural heritage but i've been to over twenty some counties up there in the far west end of the twenty five twenty six and i've also been to all of the smaller counties are in this from both for selfies to afford northeast are trying to

meet with people going to the block parties trying to sit down and do it on the day just take any question on any subject and you're like you saved people don't agree with me on every issue but at least they know where i stand our time really try try to be forthright about what i believe but i think it's so important to get people like you where honestly whether you're for me or against me in vaulted in this process because we have got to get more people interested in public service we gotta get more especially young people the kids engaged in and get involved in campaigns and i think that's one of the good things at howard dean did he brought a lot of people into the campaign of one the things on this horan about is our our website is still not where we wanted to be we hope to have a blog up are relatively soon as bowles two thousand for dot com and we all hope to have it in a better shape in just a few weeks but we work on are right now with jessie thank you for your call erskine bowles you talk about getting young people involved you're not young person who got involved in politics when you did what took you so long it was working as

cab look of brooklyn fundraiser out twelve years ago actually i am i did get involved in early a job my job my daddy was the democratic nominee for governor and it said need to and i helped him so much he was the first democrat to lose its reconstruction question i have the of their own politics of all what i've also my dad used to talk about the importance of adding to the community would pile he believe that all of us have a responsibility to do some for community any really stress it to my sister's intimate and so i've been involved in my community as helen but mumbo the sisters to a great extent whether it's elmo from our son's head of the juvenile diabetes and so i really get involved with the juvenile diabetes foundation of became a national press and of it i think we've done some great things and make some great advances i've served here on the op ed is the vice chairman of the carolinas medical center which is our public hospital in tone

and vivaldi on here with the goalie foundation i hated overall prosperity task force even served on the global trends report down in jessica's award help cutting try to bring jobs to north carolina to scale and so what i try to do try to do is fan a good portion my tam on in the business world making a living providing for my family grow a business that i started and and also we're a very very large percentage do in public service erskine bowles as our guest speaking in eastern north carolina you mentioned the global transporter there there's also another issue here about the sky's not c o l f the outlying landing field that the navy was to put in washington county and a number of people in that county and the area around it are opposed to that what's your position on aol's the navy says it needs this this landing strip in order to have this super hornet jets now i'm opposed to it off and i suggested that two years

ago the first believe it even more strongly today i think the evidence so far is strong in favor of not putting in there and i would for more prefer a parallel strip are incredibly county i think that's where the jets will be it's where economic impact and then if it will be an r think a perilous trip for maximum sentence you think folks in your inner welcome the iowa i think i think it would because it's simply a perilous trip next to the kirkland detailed plan and also getting the jets are severe getting the economic benefits wilson awards hour we go now to david in raleigh david welcome so yes taking michael moore and i have a question about something that the wto world trade organization has been doing in that is its very limits people have challenge to the genital area that challenge other countries rather than challenge arts environmental regulation hurts

to pray this weeks glued to the cost of the environmental costs of a product when and so they can make something in the story environment and all and we have to follow environmental regulations i was wondering where you stood on this and how would you fix that says easy fix i'm not i've already set up another vote for any future trade agreements until we start enforcing the trade agreements we got on the books but any future trade agreement that i did support would have to have labor and environmental provisions in the document itself of all was a david i think you just and there was a race to the bottom david thank you for your call the vanguard and david was talking of environment in other countries that's so mica degraded an effort to get to the bottom line and then undercut tower under sell products to the us but he you have been talking recently on the campaign trail about the environment as well you're taking

issue with president bush's clear skies initiative and you think you called it the other day in environmental euphemism and this is the one that would the president a few months ago saying that coal burning plants expand and put off having to comply with the clean air regulations in how how do you make that initial for north carolina chocolate it's a very few go into western north carolina art is not just an environmental issue it's a health care issue that it is a economic issue to say the very least part of the reason i said it was an environmental euphemism that is because it is the clear sky as an astute will lead to more carbon dioxide more subtle yards out more nitrogen and more mercury new atmosphere than the strict enforcement of our current laws are and i think it is you travel in them because from an environmental viewpoint you see the degradation or to topple now mitchell if you if you see the view we can see i used to never see as far into great smoky mountains you see in the grand tetons you can any

more art but for my health care viewpoint you know the instance of asthma for kids up in amounts of north carolina is three times humanity has anywhere else in the state if you if you look at what's happened to the health care of older folks very truly really terrible end and the cost of taking care of these health care problem is a lot of the communities so that a negative economic benefit plus the tourist dot com and when a tourist oh combat tours dollar circulates seven times and commutes more on the most powerful economic motivators you can have and so what i think is we you know we really do have to force and we had a senator who will go to watch an air force tv a and these midwestern coal companies to clean up the smokestacks that we've done the right thing in north carolina we've actually lead the white we have a clear smokestacks at our utilities in our government got together and we reached a common sense solution that's what we got into nationally and so you are geographically

speaking here you're saying that that the prevailing winds are coming from the west and from from the midwest from those coal burning plants and that's why because of federal the it gets water from and you just do it at a big regional problem and you can't solve it just let us do the right thing we got to get other states and the right thing to do you know if you look at the senate you're dealing with senators from a lot of these midwestern states mean how do you how do you sell that to them how do you persuade them that this is the thing to do because it is in their economic interest perhaps for their the utilities back home to say a whitewash we bother cleaning up that ayers was gonna go east anyway i think that i think it's just like anything else i think first dude permits people are simply the right thing to do i think you can you can i mean they want to show people what's happened to the health of kids in western north carolina what you show what the economic impact has been to western north carolina and what you show and the degradation of our beautiful mounds i think people will see and i think you can do this some people that way otherwise you know you're you know just like

anything else you know you got a good people who are going to need my vote on certain things in order to to get it done and it's just gonna be a sacred parties i better be a weakened its fifty one other people but this makes sense to do if you're the us senate you're one of a hundred and that your experience too to date has been neither as an executive in the inner business investment banking or chief of staff in the white house and its that's the shaft is it you're in a club where you you have to compromise you perhaps more than you did is as an executive you do have to compromise a great deal and i think that someone the things you have to understand that you also have to had the ability to get to yes you gotta have the ability to convince people that you're right nobody believed that we could balance the federal budget if you go back and read the newspapers are one approach the romeo mayor announced he was bringing me back to balance a budget nobody believed it could be done as president clinton right republicans or democrats and literally literally i mean i did spent all that time blocked double gingrich and lauded dead zone gephardt and then i went

around me and all the other constituent groups here and we failed of those we felt that commonsense it we can do that all things like the tobacco buyout know that will be good for north carolina and good for a kid how to balance the budget now because beyond depending on a calculated the budget deficit next year is between twenty thirty seven billion to over five hundred billion that have the bush tax cuts kicking and how as a senator would you lita belts you don't have the cudgel it had before and elderly people into the room which you do have the odd lucky and blessed you know one of the things all over cabinet secretaries reporter the chief of staff and all i'm a negotiator budget from tuesday so i understand the federal budget and how it works our understand the accounting up very few think enron get their books on a crazy noises many see nothing to using the federal government but i understand how it's done out there are also have had experience dealing with people out of their art gave the trust and knowledge of people on both

sides of the aisle and i believe i can get to that common sense center where decisions are made by paddy do a war ii we did is we took spending from twenty two percent of gdp down to eighteen percent of gdp week that's how we balance the federal budget this administration has taken revenues from almost twenty one percent of gdp down to just under sixteen percent of gdp right you know it's not hard to figure out when sweden are winning ad spending at twentieth twenty percent of gdp territory network so gdp in to get revenues sixty was in gdp hugo hugo have a deficit so what you have to do is you have to get the economy moving so you freeze revenues you've got a cut expenses if you can and yet it starts at twenty three billion over four percent and then you can move forward to what we're talking about issues and math with democratic candidate for us senate erskine bowles just had more your calls one eight seven seven nine six to ninety six to that swanee seven seven nine six to nineteen sixty state of things

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been leaking it's bad this is the state of things i'm linda the race for the us senate seat being vacated by john edwards be hotly contested in november we have with us erskine bowles who is the democrat who is hoping to be the us senator we had interviewed richard burr the report likely republican contender for the senate seat a few months ago and this hour we're talking with democrat erskine bowles and taking your calls on numbers one eight seven seven nine six to nine eight sixteen just before the breakers composer talking about the budget and

your time for two years as chief of staff in and bill clinton's white house and something struck me is you're talking about that you are saying that you do been up there and you know how that works and sometimes when people run for office they ate there saying i'm an outsider i'm coming in i'm going to change things and non insider the flation vote for me but you're saying i've been there and that's why should voters will say that's at both ways politicians and that's the ugly truth hidden past that thirty five years in the business world so you are pride myself about that the vast majority of all i've lived to work it right here in north carolina greeting jobs start businesses work in our community and i've been a volunteer and i didn't have the blessing of having the experience of about sabina five or six years wash and where i did work on the budget and it and the reason i think experience makes sense is you know i approach

i'm a fiscal conservative i really do i believe in balanced budgets i really believe that we shouldn't pass along a dead aunt or a kid but i think you have to balance the budget in the right way and that's where i think the experience plays off we'd balance the budget in nineteen ninety seven we had the largest increase in education spending in thirty years the largest increase in pell grants in twenty years that more kids could go to college we had i would put a hundred thousand additional teachers in the classroom wessel yes smaller class sizes we've got thirty six thousand new spot for headstart so more kids could enter school ready to learn without healthcare surfer flatly import years and we did that all while balancing a budget so i think there's a right way wrong way to do it i think we've got a go for to be smart and that means investing in the future of this country so we can compete in his new world war and he is with us from chapel hill i um i always very victim i figure out who's of people who were more qualified to make senator sanders can bolt but

they're not a millionaire bankers that they can't raise money from millionaires and big corporations ah what mr baldwin to do is when you go on that offended that is dominated by millionaires representing by and large of millionaires in their cars and big corporations and it has fundamentally undermine our democracy and we're almost a media blitz despair that where we're at the point and over toward my question very specifically first impulse is what if you going to do very specifically for thorough campaign finance reform so that people who are regular people could run for the us senate and with first of all you're a hundred percent raw i got over again but he's been more

blessed than i have but also think i have some some pretty decent values which are tomorrow my parents once my dad supposed to get a big award unsteady so said thank you appreciate done a lot but he said look i don't want you all to judge me based on just what i've done he said i want you to judge me based on what my children do for others and you know that hair an enormous impact on my sisters and me and i think it's why i have tried to spend so much time you know working in my community it's hard and i take in a campaign when you meet folks who you know like this school bus driver and that the other day in greensburg who didn't take his daughter to the house to the doctors cause he didn't have health care insurance you know you know that's a response to believe that we have to give kids' health care insurance but your question was on campaign finance reform i

supported full force mccain feingold i don't think it goes far enough yeah flaky i'm very worried about all those big money get back into politics common in through these are you know these wave year called i know what you call many more where they are able to get another soft money this soft money i would i would love to see full public financing of campaigns they'll a thing that i wanna make sure of is that if that the challengers are running against incumbent which is not the case i'm in now but challengers running as incumbents have a chance to get is well known as e commerce or so on a level playing field but i think you're right some point and we got to go to public financing will that peter is still their routine well first are there hazards couples answer the question you know ardent allende and i'm very happy to hear that he is for full public financing and i think a lot of the short and we have a tv in maine we haven't in arizona aw on the state level there have been

built or your local public line at the federal level all my judges now to north carolina which is a good thing ever prickly ever tour of poor record an appellate court judge unison some make the case there that the campaign finance reform we've had in fits and starts have brought has brought us to this point where it would be people who have great personal wealth then john cores on a new jersey others senator senate candidates have been people who have great personal wealth have been able to finance their campaigns erskine bowles got finished about the i don't know you know berber exact percentage but probably thirty to forty percent of the cost of the campaign and the damage to the last campaign at boston ma ri our own staff fifteen million dollars i think was the total amount and if so it's an awfully guest bit less amount or about the same as my opponent did these things are ludicrously expensive art i live very happy to see anything that holds up the call to

campaigns anything to provide public financing for campaigned hard work so i don't have any disagreement with pete in this area we may have disagreements another internet this week a bill is with us from carver oh hi bill both common for the very inefficient and one that will make a lot of that kind of health insurance you actually mention that moment only law that if you would sort of tango parents' health insurance from canada and from other countries and one issue that has denounced this as there's a national health plan dr joshua practice that it's basically one insurance company like medicare for all and canada that may have and about half what we do what happens on healthcare have a longer life expectancy lower infant mortality and many other and crude indicators over our

level despite that defense much on the profit and the administration of private health insurance companies erskine bowles always stand on the idiots as single payer its health system by i probably get there in a different way than builders bilbao away my daughter is a second year residents are and so i hear this from her as but i also see it when i talk to people who don't have health care insurance you're right in a lot of areas we spin forty percent of gdp in this country all on health care no other developed nation spends more than ten percent and most benign percent less yet we only provide healthcare insurers to eighty five percent of our people everybody else covers all their people and anybody who's lived in who doesn't believe and i know you see this bill and doesn't believe those forty four million americans who don't have healthcare insurers don't get health care is crazy they get health care they just good humored see room where the cost would be four five times and i'd be in a doctor's office an ad calls doesn't just disappear you know it you know we paid for we pay for two ways we pay for higher

taxes because we do the right thing we take your people can take care of him and we also pay for it in our insurance calls gaza gets caught shifted so where is i think we have the greatest health care in this country i think we have this debate is health care delivery system that you can possibly imagine sort of what i think is practical again i'm a practical person i think that we've got a cover the uninsured i think we have to get his bill is sick but we gotta get there on a step by step basis i would start first with a deadly kids who don't have health care insurance i think that is morally wrong then i would go to their parents and then i would go to the people who had cobra health care insurance which in a cobra for the badger that's what people get when they lose a job nobody can afford it and getting up to play an awesome and i think that would cover about thirty some million of the forty four million i think those were all the steps and right direction but until we provide health care insurance to everybody or make it affordable for everybody

we're going to continue to have this call shifted the principal problem that small businesses have such a big problem that are in reforming health care insurers are providing to their employees because they don't have the market muscle to bring down the cost of health care insurance bill thank you recall what a switch gears here and talk about iraq for you for you or not in the senate now when the vote came up how would you voted when president bush asked congress for authorization go to war with iraq are actually a half hours this is two years ago my answers is always yes i would have voted yes and i also would have voted for the eighty seven billion dollars our costs i said at the time that as you remember when i was one of cuba's death for us all the pros just barely breathe on that with it you know the cia briefer every single day and i have permission talk about this no but you know at the temple and it nice of an idea we saw evidence that presented by

the intelligence services that saddam hussein had chemical and biological weapons i did not see any evidence of nuclear weapons our end we've therefore our work with the congress to get a resolution passed the call for regime change believed that we needed but this was a very dangerous cabot needed to be removed i said at the tattered the bush administration are call for the resolution that out they'll be headed heifer right in half rome where they were right was that winning the war would be easy where they go wrong is when he said winning the peace would be easy what they said is they felt that post war a rock would be like post war germany or japan after war were to an asset at the time two years ago i said that we are always going to be like yugoslavia and i think that's what it's turned out to be ended we would in there by ourselves that we would only problem we would on the cost of manpower and we would cost

in dollars and therefore if we were to go in there we darn well but to go in with all of our allies on our side otherwise we will be a very it was going to be a very very very difficult problem so if your letter to the senate in november you take office next year what would you do in the senate because he you do have a situation where it seems like it could go on for a long time it's not going the way the administration had hoped what we do as a senator to get in get out of what some might say is almost becoming a quagmire number one i would try to tell the truth and i would tell the truth and if you look at the new budget that just came out there's not a penny and therefore single soldier and a rock or or are already in afghanistan after this year and i think that's just not tell the american people the truth but what would i do specifically i would work as hard as i can to turn the river the political reconstruction of iraq to

international parties i think that is critically important the second thing i would do is i would work as far as i could within the coalition of people republicans and democrats in order reconstitute the iraqi army are antiquated and trained properly so we can get our jazz other young men and young women and the last thing i would do for sure is i would support the rebuilding of iraq because i think it is we teach the only chance we've got to leave is liberalism not occupiers there are some critics who claim that there were intelligence failures in the clinton white house the late nineties that they have increased the likelihood of that the terrorist attacks were what you were the white house chief of staff during this time what would you say to the park i don't i don't honestly know yeah i can say that is a center here that as it relates to two rock that mean we salt pellets of chemical biological weapons there as it relates to terrorism

then a solid metal on which i think is a completely different subject because we did not see any connection between saddam hussein and a solid that one was in order i think there's been any proof that is any we took we saw that as a very very dangerous threat asylum in london and we actually tripled the budget for counterterrorism we set up our across terrorism task force and the national security council we've met every two three weeks on this as opposed to when the bush administration went into power between the day they went into power in september eleventh i think they met on terrorism twice so we really saw this is a big problem we also borrow tried to get legislation through congress to cut off of funding to over to the taliban we are authorized the cia to going to get a solid them a lot and we tried to train selma pakistani own militia to go in there and get in our waste

broke up about twenty sales throughout for a world we stopped attempts to blow up for lincoln and hobbled holland tunnel is in new york to the broader federal building in boston we are stopped an attempt assessment the pope was dubbed intend to blow up an airliner villa paintings which outlived him to blog allie x i think we get a lot of unfortunately and this essay more immediate and fortune lee it took great cataclysmic event like september eleventh for people to believe that this really was a threat they were we went to the carson tried to get support are as example a cut off of funding to the taliban and to work hard you really get a banking industry to crack down and it was totally let people poses when we say those missiles in there to get the assault that london and into afghanistan people said was wag the dog so it was tough to get people reckon as how big a problem this was about god we sure so it was a big problem in the closing met just if you could tell me briefly what's your

position on the homeland security and some aspects of the patriot act really nice be revisited in about ten seconds yes it is should be revisited some parts of it that are okay it's imported need to be absolutely riveted to what my thing we don't do is we try to protect our ports of an abductor nuclear facilities without a protect our electrical power grid we gotta get the funding to our front line defenders for farber please so there are lots of things within our medical community that need to be done or stumbles the internet's arisen with us today you damage your very much erskine bowles is the democratic hopeful for the us senate seat that is being vacated by john edwards this year of course is in november and say things were today shows produced by dave dewitt in directed by keith wilson robin copley is the technical director and fred wasser is our executive producer thank you as always for missing know if you have a comment about the show that we'd love to hear from you our email address is s o t a w and c dub old party thai melinda penta and

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