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Parker Spitzer
Middle Tax Cut Vote; Interview With Rep. Barney Frank; Interview With Gene Simmons
Aired December 02, 2010 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KATHLEEN PARKER, CO-HOST: Good evening. I'm Kathleen Parker.
ELIOT SPITZER, CO-HOST: And I'm Eliot Spitzer. Welcome to the program.
Coming up: Today's vote on the middle tax cut may look like a Democratic win, but is it a lasting victory? You know what I think but we'll talk about the top strategist, the ragin' Cajun, James Carville -- always an exciting conversation.
PARKER: Plus, KISS, rocker Gene Simmons joins us. His life and rock n' roll, his desire to replace Simon Cowell on "American Idol" -- and, get this, he's a fan of George W. Bush.
SPITZER: That is going to be interesting.
But, first, as always, our "Opening Argument." Let me tell you this -- hats off to Speaker Pelosi. Kathleen, they may call it a lame-duck Congress but it quacks and it did something important today. They passed the tax cut for the middle class, only the middle class, those who are $250,000 income and below.
It's good economics. It's good policy. It's the principle Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats believe in. And get this -- 60-plus percent of the public believes it as well.
So, I say congratulations, it's the right thing to do.
And who is out there dumping all over this? Let's listen to what John Boehner, the incoming speaker of the House, had to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. JOHN BOEHNER (R-OH), HOUSE SPEAKER-DESIGNATE: I'm trying to catch my breath so I don't refer to this maneuver going on today as chicken crap, all right? But this is nonsense, all right? The election was one month ago. We're 23 months from the next election and the political games have already started, trying to set up the next election.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SPITZER: Let me tell you what is nonsense. His language is an outrage. People should be furious. Just yesterday, he's at the White House saying, bipartisan this, bipartisan this. You know what? He's dumping on something 60 percent of the public knows is good policy. I think that was shameful behavior by John Boehner.
PARKER: Eliot, you have missed your calling. You need to be on Broadway. You could -- can you do that Boehner imitation just one more time for me, please?
SPITZER: No, I don't have the tan for it.
PARKER: But let's talk about the rich. I've made this argument before. I think we're making a big mistake by demonizing the so- called "rich" as though they have somehow done something wrong. I mean, there's a difference between -- let me finish. There's a difference between the working rich, the $250,000 per household. These are people who have worked hard, they paid their bills.
SPITZER: Yes.
PARKER: They have raised kids. Probably have elderly parents that they are taking care of or looking out for at least, and then looking down the road and they want to hang on to some of their money so they're not a burden to society and government.
So, my position on this is -- why not raise the ceiling on how we define the rich. Because it is a penalty. Let's make -- set it at $1 million or, you know, fix it as a sliding scale. You know, at least change the tenor of the conversation.
SPITZER: All right. Anyway, we will continue this tax debate conversation with our "Headliner."
Joining us now from Washington, the most influential voices in Democratic Party, Congressman Barney Frank.
Congressman, thank you for joining us.
REP. BARNEY FRANK (D), MASSACHUSETTS: Glad to.
SPITZER: Is there any hope that perhaps you can bring in the extension of unemployment compensation as part of the package that has finally passed here?
FRANK: That's part of the conversation. And the vote today strengthened our hand in doing that. Again, the vote said today that there's a significant number of representatives who believe that. There's unemployment compensation. There are other tax issues that are relevant.
Yes. Again, we need to be clear about what the right wing is saying. A, we care so much about the deficit that we can't extend unemployment for people who are out of work. Although some of them have deciding to argue that it's just lazy people and if you make their children suffer enough, they will stop hanging out and go get a job apparently. SPITZER: Right.
FRANK: You know, because you have to remember, it's the children of the unemployed who are really very much at risk here.
SPITZER: And this is --
PARKER: Some Republicans, though, have recommended extending and do want to extend the unemployment benefits. Scott Brown --
FRANK: Right. But by taking money away from funds that now go for other important purposes, like keeping police and firefighters on the street. What they're saying is they can't do unemployment without paying for it. But far more than the cost of unemployment will be added to the deficit if you get people making hundreds and hundreds and thousands of dollar as year a tax cut.
So, what I'm saying is that this conservative deficit is a sham because if you were primarily focused on the deficit, you wouldn't give Warren Buffett and Bill Gates the tax reduction from what the law would otherwise call for that they don't want.
PARKER: Well, I couldn't agree more with you in terms of the very, very rich. But what about the people who deal -- yes, two income families earning $250,000 -- that's not hugely rich in an urban area certainly. What about ceiling on that?
FRANK: I agree. That's a good point. In fact, one of the problems that we have, of course, is that, you know, you can't vary the taxes for cost of living and $250,000 in some places is much more or less than in others.
PARKER: Sure.
FRANK: That's where we have to compromise. I -- if you would have talked about something higher than $250,000, you could -- you could get there.
PARKER: And you would vote for that?
FRANK: Well, I would. But I don't want to be rude, Kathy, but you don't have a vote, so I can't negotiate with you. I hope you're not offended.
(LAUGHTER)
FRANK: So, I'm not going to give you a number. But, yes -- look, we understand that we don't have the votes to do what we did today, but we want to make it clear that we don't think they should have the vote so that everybody gets the full reduction, especially since, by the way, after we voted for this under Bill Clinton, as I did, and we had predictions on the 39 percent top rate would cause economic disaster. Instead, we had the best economic period in a long time. Maybe not because of that -- but at the very least, in spite of it. So, the answer is, yes, I understand the point that $250,000 might be too low and there would be people willing to go higher than $250,000. But what we did say today is, you know, you don't take the top of and give people making hundreds and hundreds of thousands and think -- remember, if you're making $500,000 a year, the total increase tax from what we want is $7,500 because it's 3 percent on $100,000 -- $250,000. It's less than that.
There's no economic argument that says if you increase the tax on people making $500,000 by a small number of thousand, that that's going to have any negative economic effect. But, yes, we would be willing to go above $250,000 if we got something from it.
SPITZER: Congressman, we only have a couple moments left, but I want to pivot if I might to the revelations about the Fed's extension of credit to the Wall Street banks and other major companies as well in a denomination of $9 trillion in aggregate -- numbers that I think are just -- people are finding staggering.
Did you and other members of the House Financial Services Committee know loans of this magnitude were being made?
FRANK: Not specifically. One of the things we did, by the way, was to curtail the power that the Fed had to do this. When -- in 2008, they began to use this power and they will no longer be able to have it. But, secondly, I have to say that I think it worked on the whole. I think we staved off worse disasters and these moneys are being paid back.
SPITZER: Congressman --
FRANK: And finally --
SPITZER: I might say, if I might just interject for a moment, I've said very clearly there's no question those loans needed to be made to stave off economic disaster. What is troublesome is, A, there was no notice given to appropriate people, from you, to other elected officials. And simultaneously, there was never a negotiation about what the banks and other companies would do for reform.
FRANK: I agree. But we fixed that in the bill. First of all, the power they have under what was then Section 13.3 of the Federal Reserve Act to do these things without any restriction is gone. They can now set up facilities. They will still be able to respond to an emergency but in a much more orderly way.
Secondly, when they were doing this, they didn't know that it was going to become public. They have any reason to expect it wouldn't. As a result of the bill that was signed by the president over the objection of almost all of the Republicans, they will now -- this was not just a one-time revelation. What we put into the bill was, one, tell us what happened in 2008 and 2009, and to -- going forward with an appropriate time delay so you don't affect the market unduly.
Anything like the Fed has done in the future under the new restrictive rules will also have to be made public. And the fact that they know that it's going to be made public I think will be a constraint and some of the problems that you talked about.
SPITZER: I think there's no question that making it public in the appropriate time frame is critically important. I think it also, however, would have been important and would have been appropriate for Ben Bernanke and Tim Geithner to reveal these loans at the moment when this bill was --
FRANK: And we have changed the authority to allow them to do that. Look, I wish a lot of things had been different in the past. All we can do and we weren't fully aware of these powers but one of the -- we did all of those things that you say should have been done then, and now is a law as a result of the bill that we got passed.
PARKER: Congressman, I want to return to the House, notwithstanding John Boehner's remarks today. The new Republican majority House has decided to extend the olive branch across the aisle and has invited Democrats to chime in. I mean, are you feeling the love as the Republicans move forward?
FRANK: Oh, spare me. Yes, he's invited us to listen to him call a very serious piece of legislation chicken crap.
No, look, you said this is not the old John Boehner, that's true. But the old John Boehner wasn't dependent for his leadership on the Tea Party people and the right wing. And look, you have got people in the Tea Party and I saw this in my effort to work with Scott Brown, for example. Their argument has been -- this is one of the claims they made against Lisa Murkowski, and Robert Bennett, not simply that they disagreed with them substantively, but they had to work with the Democrats.
Boehner has got people who think that they shouldn't try to work with us. So, no, I wish we could expect more cooperation. But, again, this kind of name-calling that you just quoted, that obviously undermines any effort to say: cooperate with us.
SPITZER: Well, Congressman, I completely agree with your take. What we have seen is the Republican Party in its early stages of control in the House and taking -- on the Senate side, taking the agenda of this president and this Congress hostage and taking the agenda that we need hostage.
Is there any hope -- and is this just a vain hope on my part -- that the president will make an appeal to the nation, you could get the middle class tax cuts alone through the Senate? Could he persuade those wavering Democrats and a few of those moderate Republicans that this is good economics, that 60-plus percent of the American public wants it and it's critical to our future?
FRANK: I'm afraid not because I think he can move some of the Democrats. But here's the problem: my Republican, including the moderate Republicans, are frightened of what would happen in primaries.
The most significant thing that happened this year was a defeat of not Mike Castle, a liberal Republican, but Lisa Murkowski and Robert Bennett through mainstream conservatives. The defeat in Colorado, somewhat we should maybe be grateful as Democrats, I think in Nevada, in Colorado, and clearly nowhere, Democrats might not have held the Senate if they hadn't nominated people who are wholly implausible. But that's what my Republican colleagues fear.
Look, we have this now -- there was a clear majority in the House and there's a consensus in -- well, there's a poll from the Pentagon, a majority of the Senate to get rid of "don't ask, don't tell," that terribly discriminatory anti-gay measure and policy that applies to the military of good people. Every single Republican, 42 of them, including the more liberal and moderate ones, signed a letter of the century saying, don't bring it up, we'll filibuster it. And that's because they are terrified.
Olympia Snowe in Maine has had a moderate record. They're already targeting her. So, unfortunately, I'm afraid this is going to happen.
SPITZER: Congressman Frank, as always, a widely insightful conversation -- thanks for your time.
FRANK: Kathleen, Eliot, thank you.
PARKER: Thank you.
Later on, the most famous tongue in the world will be right here. Gene Simmons from the legendary band KISS joins us. Stay with us.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES CARVILLE, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: I think these guys are really worried if we continue to have this 9.5 percent unemployment that the social consequences of this would be graphic.
PARKER: Well, be specific.
CARVIILLE: Well, people -- you're going to have people (INAUDIBLE) something and these lines of people getting very edgy and you're going to have even suicides, you're going to have people that -- you know, everything.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PARKER: The brief moment of bipartisan cooperation over the tax cuts yesterday was apparently a little more than a photo-op. Today, Republicans appear to be successfully steam-rolling Democrats on the issue.
SPITZER: Joining us in "The Arena" tonight, outspoken Democratic consultant and CNN contributor, James Carville.
Always exciting to talk to you, James.
PARKER: Why do they always call you spoken, James? That seems so unfair.
(CROSSTALK)
CARVILLE: Yes, all of (INAUDIBLE) so quiet and reasonable and rationale.
SPITZER: I think you are reasonable.
Let me ask you this question. It seems to me that we, and albeit almost partisan, we as Democrats have put ourselves in an impossible position. We've delayed all of these incredibly important things we care about. Wipe the tax cuts for the middle class, "don't ask, don't tell," the DREAM Act, the START Treaty -- we delay them until the November vote.
So, we're in a position of complete weakness. Why did we push these things through when we had the majority?
CARVILLE: Kenny Rogers is saying, you got to know when to hold them and know when to fold them. We folded them. We folded them early so we're having to do all of this now. And I think he make as very good point.
And, you know, look, legislative strategy is, you know, and everybody -- just get the election over and we'll deal with it. And it turned out --
SPITZER: Turned out horrendously.
CARVILLE: Right.
PARKER: James, I'm going to answer my own question now.
CARVILLE: All right.
PARKER: You had some colorful things to say about the president recently, describing his anatomy in less than manly terms --
(CROSSTALK)
PARKER: Are you vindicated?
(LAUGHTER)
PARKER: They made me ask that, I just want you to know.
CARVILLE: It's OK. You say things and, you know, they have a way of throwing your own words back in your face.
PARKER: Well, but to the point.
CARVILLE: Right.
PARKER: To the point -- do you feel like he caved? And if so, what's going on? CARVILLE: If you believe yesterday, the deal was is that you can extend the tax cuts if you let us have unemployment compensation. So the way we're going to address the budget deficit is we'll let taxed less if you let us spend more, which seems to be something
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: O for two.
CARVILLE: O for two. And who knows what was thought of agreed to, but apparently, the presumptive speaker, the speaker-designate, or whatever you call John Boehner --
PARKER: Rising speaker.
CARVILLE: Rising speaker. Thought they had a deal and they don't have one. Who knows?
PARKER: Well, that's -- I talked to John Boehner's office today and that's what they said. They said, you know, they met, this bipartisan group that the president put together. They met in the White House. They left feeling like they had an understanding about how things are going to proceed, and that there was going to be this bipartisan agreement, and then, you know, oddly, the Democratic leadership wants to go run with this.
Was it strictly a political maneuver, because they're not going to anywhere?
CARVILLE: But it's one that they should do, because -- look, if you believe as I did, that we have two huge economic problems that this country faces, one, it's the deficit. I'm not one of these people that thinks it's not an issue. I think it is.
(CROSSTALK)
PARKER: It's huge.
CARVILLE: And I think income disparity is a huge problem that we have in this country. If you extend the tax cuts to everybody making over $250,000, you get to knock $700 billion off the deficit and you get to address the horrific problem we have of income disparity -- to me it's kind of a no-brainer.
PARKER: Well, the Republicans though argue, I'm sorry, just let me finish this one thought.
CARVILLE: Sure.
PARKER: The Republicans would argue that, yes, OK, we'll deal, we'll play with that. You can have your taxes. But you've got to cut. We've got to cut.
Now, I know, Eliot --
(CROSSTALK) PARKER: -- they are not going to do what then they are running for office.
SPITZER: They're not running anymore. They still can't answer simple question. It's voodoo economics.
CARVILLE: No, that's not fair. That's not fair.
SPITZER: Sure it is.
CARVILLE: It's not fair government. They said they want to cut NPR.
(CROSSTALK)
PARKER: I know that.
CARVILLE: They did say that.
SPITZER: Dick Armey said that they are going to cut out funding for education.
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: I want to come back to where the Democratic Party has failed in my view. I mean, I hate to harp on this, but the majority of the public want to extend tax cuts for the middle class and not the wealthy. The majority of the public wants to give unemployment insurance to those who are desperately looking for work and can't find it. Why can't the Democratic Party line up the votes and do what the public wants?
CARVILLE: I don't know. To me, the Democratic Party exists to like help the unemployed.
SPITZER: Right.
CARVILLE: The Democratic Party exists to deal with a crisis of an unregulated financial market caused by leverage and speculation. If we can't deal with that, if we were timid to do it, why do we exist? We don't exist to have funding.
(CROSSTALK)
PARKER: Can we just raise the level? What do you think of Schumer's proposal to raise the limit on -- change the definition of rich? A million or, you know, something -- like somewhere in between.
CARVILLE: Also, understand, if you make half a million dollars, you're only paying the rate on everything between $250,000 and $500,000.
PARKER: Right.
SPITZER: Right.
CARVILLE: OK. So, you're still getting -- as you go higher --
PARKER: In dollar. In actual dollar.
CARVILLE: In actual dollar.
SPITZER: It's only $6,000 though.
CARVILLE: You may have to do that. I don't know what the effect of going from $250,000 to $1 million. You know, we do know that from $250,000 to 10-year projection is $70 billion, which is a lot of money. I mean, we're talking about stuff. This is a lot to add to the deficit. Yes, that's 700 billion. So, you may have to --
(CROSSTALK)
CARVILLE: It may be what you can get. You mean, politics is all possible.
SPITZER: The middle class tax cut passed the House, all right?
CARVILLE: Right.
SPITZER: Middle class only. Vote was held today, passed the House. When it goes to the Senate, give us how do you game it out? Is there any way that the Democrats can pull the rabbit out of the hat and somehow pulling votes to cloture to end debate and then actually force a vote on this?
CARVILLE: No. No.
SPITZER: So, the moderate Democrats are going to --
CARVILLE: Well, first of all, you have the -- yes, you're going to have some Democrats that are just not going to go to the Republicans and are going to be unified on this. It's very, very -- I, you know, seldom say never is my motto, but it seems very difficult. I would be very surprised.
PARKER: Well, McConnell said -- Mitch McConnell said that it's not -- the debate is really not whether we're going to extend the tax cuts, it's for how long. That's where the debate is taking place no matter what happens on the floor today.
CARVILLE: Right. And, you know, you could say -- you could make the argument, hey, let's extend them until November, right after the election in 2012, slug it out over the period of the election to see what it is. And that --
SPITZER: Well, let me ask you this question. If you were -- if you were advising the president right now just on this issue, don't bring up unemployment yet, would you want him to extend it out beyond the 2012 elections or extend it only for one year, a year and half, so it becomes an issue in 2012?
CARVILLE: I think that they are horrific policy. I think they were a horrific idea when they're enacted. And it is a horrific idea to keep them. You can't believe that the deficit is the problem and income equality is a problem and not be for these things.
And furthermore, by every piece of evidence, they didn't work. The only argument you can make is things could have been worse without them, which is not a very good argument.
So, I would urge -- now, by the same token, I understand that numbers are numbers and he's got to deal with this. I would rather like take it and fight it out in 2012 election.
SPITZER: I'm with you. I'm with you. Bring it back as an issue.
(CROSSTALK)
CARVILLE: It's an issue.
PARKER: Sure, why not.
CARVILLE: But we didn't do a very good job of explaining to people what it is, even in spite of the poor job we did by a majority, a plurality of Americans want to do this, so, were actually one of the arguments that we're winning.
PARKER: James Carville, it's always great to have you. Thanks so much for joining us.
SPITZER: Still ahead, we know when your money is and in a moment, we'll tell you. Stay with us.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SPITZER: Having been in that game for a little while and I did OK for some period of time, you do it with a passion and say whether it's Wall Street, whether it's the environment, whether it's the middle class, just do it with some energy and some passion and then people will forgive you having an argument with the other side because they know they're with you. It's when you don't stand for anything other than Bush that they run to people who do.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PARKER: Earlier this year, I used my syndicated column to declare myself a centrist, someone who is politically anti- ideological. And it seems I'm not alone. Political independents, those neither right or left that smack dab in the broad middle, today, constitutes 42 percent of the electorate. Of course, now I'm wondering -- can a centrist movement succeed?
SPITZER: Tonight's "Constitution Avenue" guests have different answers to the viability of the political center, Thomas Frank satirically calls it the magic middle. Meanwhile, CNN contributor John Avlon literally wrote a book that what he calls the vital center.
Welcome, gentlemen. Let me begin to this by asking, what is the middle? How do you define it? What does it really stand for?
JOHN AVLON, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: I think the vast of the majority of Americans are non-ideological problem-solvers and they really distrust the absolutism our politics has started to come up with and the polarization of the two parties, the fact that the extremes have effectively hijacked our political debate and increasingly our government. And there's a commonsense resentment of that approach to politics.
SPITZER: All of which sounds wonderful and it's almost impossible to disagree with that impure concept, but obviously, you think it doesn't really translate into politics day to day. Why not?
THOMAS FRANK, WALL STREET JOURNAL: I live in Washington, D.C., and when you --
SPITZER: You can start your argument right there.
(CROSSTALK)
FRANK: To hell with that place. But, look, in Washington, D.C., centrism means, what John just said, that sounds so noble. You know, I don't know anybody that wouldn't sound of that. A practical problem solver, that's me.
PARKER: It is noble. It's wonderful.
(CROSSTALK)
FRANK: But that's not what they mean by that term in Washington, D.C. What they mean by that term in Washington, D.C., is this place -- and there is only -- by the way, the definition I'm going to give you is only something that is believed in two parts of American life. One is the sort of punditocracy in Washington, D.C., maybe here in New York as well. Present companies clearly --
(CROSSTALK)
FRANK: And then the others in political science departments of the nation.
PARKER: I'm going say something here. Talking about centrism in Washington is irrelevant, OK? Washington, as you say, it's an industry town. If you're not one thing or another, centrists are just this mushy middle people who don't have any thoughts or any ideas. No ideology. Exactly. We don't have an ideology because we're anti- ideology.
SPITZER: Now, I want to pick up on something that Thomas said before, which I think is exactly right. In fact, the Democratic Party has been very much in that middle and it's the Republican Party that's moved to the right. And I want to use one example, which is -- the example that's on the table, is the problem with the mechanics. But I want to talk about the issue that's on the table today -- the tax cut. FRANK: Yes.
SPITZER: The Democratic Party is saying give a tax cut to everybody below $250,000. Point to $500,000, nobody would be terribly upset. But 65 percent of the American public believes that. The Republican Party is holding us hostage in opposition.
So, answer to Thomas' point, isn't the Democratic Party kind of where that center is on that one critical issue?
PARKER: John, you absolutely have an answer for this and I want to you say it.
AVLON: Good. Here's the issue. The Republican Party is dominated by the far right. They think tax cuts is theology. It used to be that fiscal conservatism was synonymous to fiscal responsibility. That's stop the case during the 1990s and 2000, when all of a sudden, it was supply side no matter what.
The Democratic Party has an opportunity here if they own that.
FRANK: The conservative movement has a motto. I'm not a conservative. You guys know that. I'm pretty liberal but I admire the conservatives in all sort of ways and one of them is they have this great --
PARKER: Somehow, I think this is going to be an insult.
FRANK: What is a conservative movement about? You remember Howard Phillips (ph), the conservative caucus?
SPITZER: Oh, yes.
FRANK: He's saying way back when, in the late '70s, early '80s, we organize discontent, OK? There is -- that is the attitude that got the mood of the country exactly right this year.
AVLON: That is the attitude behind conservative populism and far left populism. And there are people who want politics to simply be a mirror of that. And I think a lot of folks here on the far right who say, you know, as you've written in the past, that bipartisanship is the most perfunctory kind of campaign rhetoric, there are people on the far right who believe that, too. To play to their base crowd, the Karl Roves that believe --
(CROSSTALK)
AVLON: Well, not in the current context. Base politics that helped create the problem as a country.
The 2010 election happened because it is -- as you know -- it's a low-turnout, high intensity election. And because we're a center- right country, if Republicans play to the base and got conservative populist outrage, especially in the time of economic downturn, they wouldn't be able to get across. SPITZER: But here's where the Democrats got it wrong and I'm with you on this. The Democratic Party by so degrading its ideology, stood for nothing. It was mush. Mush does not win. You need to stand for something.
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: They stood for such a Malcolm of nothing that nobody could stand up and say, I'm supportive because of X. But the Tea Party crafted an ideology, crazy as it may be, people could carry their pitchfork and feel good about it.
(CROSSTALK)
PARKER: You know what? You talk about people being angry. They are also angry about the pitchforks. They are tired of the partisan bickering. They may not be able to articulate a position on every single issue, which is what you want everyone to do, they want to say all they say is -- OK, that's the left, I'm not that. They see the Sarah Palin brigade on the right, they say, I'm not that. So, that leaves this is broad center where people are looking for a place to land, right?
SPITZER: You go first. You're just inching to get in there.
AVLON: Look, we've got to plant a flag from the center. We need to stand for something. We need to play offense. That's been part of the problem, how we've allowed extremes to hijack our politics here. But the problem in the whole debate right now is that 93 percent of the American people in a poll by "The Wall Street Journal" and NBC said that they're tired. I think there's too much partisan infighting in Washington. And the problem is that the elites --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's true.
AVLON: But the elites in Washington seem to think that 93 percent of the Americans are stupid. They seem to think that they don't really know what they want. And there's an academic group on the far left that always seems to think that the American people would vote socialist if they only knew how.
SPITZER: By the way, John, here's the thing. I think the Democratic Party if you understood it is in the middle. They just haven't managed to stand up and speak with enough fervor, excitement and energy to say, having --
AVLON: Bill Clinton.
SPITZER: Bill Clinton did, but I'm talking about the past couple of years. Having been in that game for a little while, and I did OK for some period of time, you do it with a passion and you say whether it's Wall Street, whether it's the environment, whether it's the middle class, just do it with some energy and some passion.
AVLON: I agree. SPITZER: And then people will forgive you having an argument with the other side because they know they're with you. It's when you don't stand for anything other than Bush that they run to people who do.
FRANK: Partisanship is one of the most disgusting things when you move to Washington, D.C., and you behold it first had and it's like you have a Republican kick ball team in the Democrat.
AVLON: Right.
FRANK: It's ridiculous and they have fistfights at keggers (ph). It's idiotic.
AVLON: Yes.
FRANK: That doesn't mean that the ideas are bad. And look, the problem is the conservative movement did a very, very good job this time around of expressing itself as a movement of the disenfranchised and reaching out to anger across the board, anti-Washington, anti- partisan anger, and the Democrats are like, but we're the party of reason.
AVLON: -- will not do as well. Here's the thing. We're a center right country.
(CROSSTALK)
FRANK: No, no, no.
PARKER: Ding, ding, ding, ding. I'm sorry, we do have to wrap up.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right.
PARKER: But before we go, let me just say this. Nobody can argue that a debate about centrism is boring. And I was going to ask you, I know you said you want to be aggressively centrist. And I thought for a while that might be an oxymoron.
AVLON: No.
PARKER: But you have proved that it is not.
AVLON: There you go.
SPITZER: All right.
AVLON: Pulling off from the center.
SPITZER: Thomas Frank, John Avlon, thank you for helping me effectively abolish the mushy center. It doesn't exist anymore.
PARKER: Wrong, wrong, Eliot.
SPITZER: You can be mushy. I'm not going to be mushy. PARKER: Not going to be mushy.
SPITZER: No.
PARKER: Meanwhile, up ahead, the front man for KISS. I'm talking about the band, Gene Simmons. Eliot, you probably think he's the singer who wears scary makeup. But he's also an original political thinker. Don't go away. You'll want to hear this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PARKER: Happy unmarried for 25 years.
GENE SIMMONS, LEGENDARY KISS ROCKER: Twenty-seven.
SHANNON TWEED, COMMON LAW KISS-MATE: Don't take those last two away from me. They were tough.
SIMMONS: Twenty-seven.
PARKER: Oh, my goodness. So what is the secret to --
TWEED: There's no secret.
SIMMONS: There is. And I'll tell you -- and I'll tell you right here. And I'll tell you what the secret is. The secret is of having Shannon Tweed be the teacher to all the women on planet earth about how to keep a relationship interesting, sexy and forever changing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PARKER: Our next guest is just the normal, happy couple, the family next door. And if you happen to live in Beverly Hills, you're constantly followed by TV cameras and one of you is famous for sticking out your tongue.
SPITZER: Gene Simmons has been the front man for the hard rock band KISS for more than 20 years and Shannon Tweed is an actress who's been in more than 50 films.
Welcome to both of you. Thanks for coming by.
GENE SIMMONS, LEGENDARY KISS ROCKER: Very, very sweet of you.
PARKER: You all are in your '60s and of your reality TV show called "The Family Jewels."
SHANNON TWEED, COMMON LAW KISS-MATE: Yes.
PARKER: You've been happily --
TWEED: Called "Gene Simmons Family Jewels."
PARKER: "Gene Simmons Family Jewels." TWEED: Yes.
PARKER: Sorry about that. I wouldn't have expected them to be yours.
But to the point --
TWEED: Technically, they are my jewels.
PARKER: Oh, OK. OK. So we're being literal here.
TWEED: Coming from his jewels.
SPITZER: We're just going to sit here. This is good.
SIMMONS: I'm not saying a word.
TWEED: They're shared jewels now.
SPITZER: You act like a married couple but you're not.
PARKER: You're not -- that's the first question I have for you, happily unmarried for 25 years.
SIMMONS: Twenty-seven.
PARKER: Twenty-seven.
TWEED: Don't take those last two away from me. They were tough.
SIMMONS: Twenty-seven.
PARKER: Oh, my goodness, so what is the secret to --
TWEED: There's no secret.
SIMMONS: There is. And I'll tell you. And I'll tell you right here. And I'll tell you what the secret it. The secret is of having Shannon Tweed be the teacher to all the women on earth about how to keep a relationship interesting, sexy and forever changing.
PARKER: You just decided not to get married? But why not?
SIMMONS: Well --
TWEED: The marriage part is not conventional, but everything else is very conventional.
SPITZER: Increasingly conventional, frankly, if you look at society out there.
TWEED: I guess. I don't plan on defending that part of it.
PARKER: It's a hedgy way for kids. Would you like your kids get to your show? When they were little, were they rocker kids? SIMMONS: Yes, the rocker kids are fine, but just, again, full disclosure, I've never been high or drunk in my life and I've never smoked cigarettes.
TWEED: And neither have the kids.
SIMMONS: That's a personal choice. I'm not saying this is a political plan before anything else.
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: Do you think that surprises your fans? Do you think that would surprise your fans if they heard that?
SIMMONS: Initially they did, but I've badgered people and they've heard it so much. OK, I know --
TWEED: He will make you put your cigarette out.
SIMMONS: I will not be in the same room with anybody that smokes.
SPITZER: Second hand smoke.
SIMMONS: Yes.
SPITZER: And in this series, this year's series, you begin over in Amsterdam visiting Anne Frank's house.
TWEED: Yes.
SPITZER: Which is not a conventional reality TV show.
TWEED: No, it's a --
SPITZER: This is one of the most powerful diary of Anne Frank being one of the most powerful books ever written. Explain this, why there? What's it been?
SIMMONS: We were -- Kiss was on tour around the world and the cameras followed us and we met -- we stopped in Amsterdam. We met a 13-year-old boy who was so proud of his grandfather who survived the German Nazi holocaust of World War II. And he wanted to do an article on me as a man who happens to be abandoned. But he was interested in my mother who, likewise, survived the concentration camps. And we then were invited to go see the Anne Frank house. And I will tell you initially we went there and I thought it was going to be sort of a sad day and just a sort of a historical overview, but it impacted me so much that I broke down because when I looked at the face of Anne Frank, a 13-year-old Jewish Dutch girl, I immediately saw my mother who, at 14 years of age, was herself drived into the concentration camps and saw her whole family wiped out. And the problem with -- I used to be a sixth grade teacher myself. The problem with information and history and schools is you think of it as far away. It's in the history books, the holocaust. It's just a phrase. And the truth is it happened yesterday. It happened to my mother. I never met my grandfathers or my grandmothers. They were all wiped up in the gas chambers of Nazi Germany. And the phrase, if we don't learn from history, we're doomed to repeat it, actually means something. And I would urge everybody out there in all seriousness, if you haven't read a book by a 13-year-old girl while she was alive, you must read "The Diary of Anne Frank" because it's an inspirational book about life.
SPITZER: We'll be right back.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SIMMONS: I voted for President Bush. I voted for President Clinton and although I do want my vote back, I voted for President Obama. We vote for all sorts of reasons. I would like to think all of us vote for one reason. We vote our conscience. And, you know, by the way, as a wakeup call to all of you, Al Qaeda doesn't care what political party you are. They want you all to die.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PARKER: You have -- it might surprise some people to know that you were a supporter of George W. Bush and you were behind the war in Iraq.
SIMMONS: Unlike most Americans, we don't vote by party. We both by the person because a person is bigger than the party, which is why sometimes the Democrats get in and sometimes the Republicans get in. I voted for President Bush. I voted for President Clinton and although I do want my vote back, I voted for President Obama.
We vote for all sorts of reasons. I would like to think all of us vote for one reason. We vote our conscience. And, you know, by the way, as a wake-up call to all of you, Al Qaeda doesn't care what political party you are. They want you all to die.
SPITZER: We come back to Iraq. I mean, you supported it. I think many people at the time when the president said there were weapons of mass destruction thought this was --
SIMMONS: I don't care about that.
SPITZER: That was not the reason.
SIMMONS: No. I don't care whether there are or not. And politicians lie every day. I believe clearly that if you don't deal with a nuclear Iran now, and if you don't deal with Al Qaeda before it gets its hands on dirty weapons and if you don't stop the nonsense there, and yes, I think there's going to be some nation-building.
I'm a very conservative foreign policy person. Fiscally, I'm very conservative. I don't believe in welfare states. I believe in giving people jobs. Most importantly, I believe I'm like most Americans. I'm socially liberal. I want to separate church and state. I think anybody who's gay, for God's sake if what you want to fight for is to be married, that's all, please. You know, let anybody get married if they want to and I wish you luck. But I'm socially as liberal as you can get.
PARKER: Gene, may I get back to one thing you said. What is it about -- why do you wish you could take back your Obama vote?
SIMMONS: Because I voted because the man that was running was a moment in history. I -- in the back of my mind, I wanted to show the world that America, the land of slaves, the land that tortured its black population for hundreds of years is also the place of hope that you'd give an African-American a chance to lead the most powerful place on the planet. However, if you take a look at the resume, you couldn't find somebody, in retrospect, more unqualified. Two years in public office, never ran his own company. So after the fact, I was questioning the qualification.
SPITZER: You're so passionate about this and so persuasive when you speak. But your music seems frankly, kind of devoid of politics.
PARKER: I think I hear --
SPITZER: Did you ever think -- did you ever think of using your music as a vehicle for --
SIMMONS: Well, the last thing you want to hear is --
TWEED: It may not be as popular if you start talking about politics while singing.
SPITZER: But you care about this so much.
SIMMONS: In the same way that I don't want to hear our president start rocking out to a rock tune, I don't think rockers discussing politics because qualification is most important. I have said this --
TWEED: Sex and drugs and rock and roll.
SIMMONS: Yes.
TWEED: Sex and rock and roll.
SIMMONS: Sing about what you know about the most, you know.
SPITZER: Right.
SIMMONS: What I discovered, however, by reading "The Wall Street Journal" but especially by seeing all the pop culture news is, I never knew that in America that our foreign policy was actually decided in Malibu. I never knew that. I didn't know that Sean Penn was our foreign policy expert. It's a revelation. That's what you want to hear is morons who are actually in movies and playing guitars.
SPITZER: You joked about it, running for president. Are you going to get into public life?
SIMMONS: As soon as they pay me enough and I --
SPITZER: How much money?
SIMMONS: I believe in democracy.
TWEED: And that's a no.
SIMMONS: But I think the more effective form of government is a benevolent dictator and you're looking at it.
SPITZER: All right.
PARKER: All right. You all are fantastic. Thank you so much.
The show airs this Sunday at 9:00 p.m. on A&E. Shannon, Gene, thank you so much for coming.
TWEED: Thank you.
SIMMONS: Thank you, guys.
SPITZER: Coming up, we're just a few minutes away from "Our Political Party." We'll be right back.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEPHEN A. SMITH, SYNDICATED RADIO HOST: You're 80 years old, man. You've been in office for 40 years. You've got the president of the United States, the speaker of the House saying, you know what, you might want to step away. You want to be defiant, robust, claiming you're innocent and then you go from a weak -- lay the crime before Congress? I'm done with him. It's absolutely ridiculous. It's an utter disgrace that he found himself in this position and then to not have the decency to walk away for the citizens of Harlem. They deserve better than that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PARKER: Welcome to "Our Political Party," a chance for us to invite the guests we like to speak their minds. Let's meet tonight's. We have Stephen A. Smith who only seems to be four feet tall. He's actually all legs. And he has his own nationally syndicated radio show.
STEPHEN A. SMITH, SYNDICATED RADIO HOST: Yes.
PARKER: And we have Elise Jordan who's a former speechwriter for Condoleezza Rice and looks beautiful in blue.
ELISE JORDAN, FMR. SPEECHWRITER FOR CONDOLEEZZA RICE: Well, thank you.
SPITZER: And Sam Seder who hosts the Internet radio show "The Majority Report." I'm not going to comment on his looks. Welcome, everyone. Although you did say that was a new gift. That sweater vest very nutty, I will say, Sam.
SAM SEDER, HOST, "THE MAJORITY REPORT": Thank you.
SPITZER: All right. 80-year-old Charlie Rangel was on the floor of the House of Representatives today pleading for his political life. It was an impassioned statement. Let's take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. CHARLES RANGEL (R), NEW YORK: I was in Korea as a young 20- year-old volunteer in the Second Infantry Division and subzero weather, 20 degrees below zero, the Chinese surrounded us and attacked and there were hundreds of casualties, wounded and killed and captured. Bugles blared and screams were heard and I was wounded and I had no thoughts that I would be able to survive.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SPITZER: All right, guys. Does he persuade you? Should Charlie be shown the exit or has Charlie persuaded you he deserves to continue on fighting for central Harlem?
SMITH: Well, I'm not going to sit there and say he deserves to be shown the exit, but he certainly hasn't convinced me. I think it's an absolute disgrace that he, of all people, conducted himself in this fashion. He was on the Ways and Means Committee. I mean, to consider the way that he tried to evade the tax laws in this country, tried to get away with pretty much pocketed money, he can sit there and say that he didn't benefit the way he wanted to. But if you're not sitting there and reporting income, it is a personal gain to you. But more importantly than that, you're 80 years old, man. You've been in office for 40 years. You've got the president of the United States, the speaker of the House saying, you know what, you might want to step away. You want to be defiant, robust, claiming your innocent, and then you go from that to a weak -- lay the crime before Congress? I'm done with him. It's absolutely ridiculous. It's an utter disgrace that he found himself in this position and to not have the decency to walk away for the citizens of Harlem. They deserve better than that even though --
SPITZER: Wait, I'm going to come back to that thought. Elise, what do you say?
JORDAN: I think he's just demonstrating such a sense of entitlement and his logic that he's a war hero and he should be off the hook, you know, he did this and that in the Korean War. So that means that any returning veteran has the license to commit crimes? I mean, I just -- I don't buy it and I think it's really disgraceful.
SPITZER: Sam?
SEDER: Well, the point is he didn't commit a crime. I mean, he wasn't convicted of anything and there's no precedent to censure someone in this type of situation. Maybe a reprimand. But, I mean, he hasn't committed a crime. He didn't commit any fraud. He was open with the committee. He was open after the fact. And so, you know, I don't think it's because he's a war vet. I think it's just a question of precedence.
PARKER: You know, I have to say, I think anyone feels sorry for someone who's 80 years old at that point in your life to be reprimanded and censured. But let me just say this, I think less of the man, honest to goodness, for using his war heroism, his war record as a defense at this point. Because, you know, if other people talk of your heroism, it's not something you boast yourself.
SPITZER: I want to ask another question. Can we change the subject? Do we have coverage left here? Tax cuts. Up on Capitol Hill today, they passed a bill to keep the tax cuts only for the people below 250,000. Good move? Bad move? Do you agree with it?
SEDER: It's a great move. And you know, I'll tell you something. What was really offensive is that Representative Boehner is talking about -- he called it chicken crap.
SPITZER: Chicken crap. Yes.
SEDER: Well, he should check with his own district because 99 percent of the people in his district will receive that Obama Democratic tax cut. And so, you know, if he wants to go back to his district and say what you've been given is chicken crap, then I think the voters should take a look at him.
PARKER: Just for the record, let me just say I spoke to John Boehner's office today. I said you've got to tell me about this chicken crap thing which I don't like to say it because it's not the way I speak. But anyway, in public, that is, they said that Mr. Boehner and others went to the White House and they sat down with the president and they had an agreement going out the door for a bipartisan solution, at least a mechanism for that solution and he felt that they had an agreement.
SPITZER: They have a solution. They had an agreement to talk.
PARKER: They had an agreement to talk.
SPITZER: So why can't Democrats bring up a vote --
PARKER: I think they felt like -- you know, this is what he said.
SMITH: I believe, at this moment in time, everybody, no tax hike whatsoever should be implemented. So I don't think there should be a situation where it will just be for 250k and under. I think for everybody -- momentarily.
SEDER: There's no economic reason for that. Because the fact of the matter is that for people who make over $250,000, study after study after study has shown that that money does not end up in the economy. It doesn't have a stimulating effect on the economy.
SPITZER: Guys, we've got to take a quick break. We'll continue with this with the party in one moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, I'm Tom Foreman. More of "PARKER SPITZER" in a moment. First, the latest news.
Convicted murderer Steven Hayes will be executed for the killings of Jennifer Hawke-Petit and her two daughters. They died during a brutal 2007 home invasion. The Connecticut who issued the sentence followed the jury's recommendation.
And tonight on "360," the military's top leadership addressed the critics point by point on why they think "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" should end.
That is the latest news. I'm Tom Foreman. Now back to "PARKER SPITZER."
PARKER: Welcome back to "Our Political Party." We're going to pick it up where we left off. Stephen A., finish that thought.
SMITH: Bottom line is this, I understand exactly what he's saying but the reality is that perception is reality. This is what we're constantly told. So, yes, you have people making 250k or less. It's good that they've got some kind of tax cut being implemented. But the reality is that businesses usually generate more money than that hiring folks if the perception is that you're going to receive some kind of tax hike. That's the perfect excuse not to go out and hire which ultimately means --
SEDER: This is not about hiring people. And this is not about --
PARKER: No, but 50 percent of small business income will be taxed at a higher rate.
SPITZER: No, I still think that number is way off.
SEDER: Exactly. How big do you want to define small business?
SPITZER: I want to add another component to this.
PARKER: Who cares? They're hiring people or not.
SPITZER: The other piece of this that should be considered is unemployment insurance.
SMITH: Yes.
SPITZER: Would you extend it? People are running out. Their unemployment insurance is being cut off as we speak. Would you extend that for people?
SMITH: As much as I hate it because of the national debt and what we're experiencing the reality is, you've got to do it. You can't leave people out there hanging and drying and suffering. And not only that, especially when it's because of Wall Street and it's because of the government that got us into this position. PARKER: OK. Elise, agree?
SMITH: You've got to look out for the American people.
JORDAN: Well, I think there are other solutions than extending the unemployment benefits. I think that we can, you know, segue into other social programs that we already have existing instead of increasing entitlements.
PARKER: How about Scott Brown today? He made a proposal that we go ahead and extend the unemployment, use money that's not being used already. Put it out there, it's going to get reinvested in the economy. Doesn't that work? It saves people from going hungry in the streets. Come on.
SEDER: And you need to do it and it's the most practical thing. And in terms of -- listen, there's only one way we're going to get out of our deficit and our debt. And that is to grow the economy. And the only way you grow the economy is to put money into people's pockets.
PARKER: Stephen A. Smith, Elise Jordan, Sam Seder, thank you so much for coming to our party.
SPITZER: Good night from New York. "LARRY KING LIVE" starts right now.
