Return to Transcripts main page
Parker Spitzer
Tax Cut Deal; Defiant Democrats; Obama Issues Warning
Aired December 09, 2010 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KATHLEEN PARKER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening, I'm Kathleen Parker.
ELIOT SPITZER, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Eliot Spitzer. Welcome to the program.
Tonight, Kathleen, fireworks on Capitol Hill. House Democrats in open revolt. They are saying to the White House and to the president, pragmatism is not an ideology. Don't cut a deal just to get -- cut a deal and expect us to sign off on it.
They won't even take his tax bill to the floor. They are saying, go renegotiate. He is like a school kid who's been sent home again to redo his homework because it was that bad the first time around.
And you know what? They're right. He embraced George Bush's economic policies. And the Democrats in the House are saying, start over. This is not for us.
PARKER: You know, Eliot, I have to say that just objectively looking at this, it looks terrible for the president in the moment. You know he looks weak and -- we're animals, right? We're -- human reaction to somebody who is weak is contempt.
SPITZER: Right.
PARKER: And then there is this pack effect. They're coming after him. But I have to say in the long run, it could actually help him because the truth is the president has to get elected in 2012 -- reelected, that is. And he's got to get the moderates and the centrists and the independents back. So he may end up looking good in the longer run. But for right now, it seems like he's is in a terrible mind.
SPITZER: No. He looks weak. You can't come back from looking weak, in my view. He has no strength. He stands for nothing. He has forsaken ideology for cutting any deal insight. He did it initially with the Republicans on the stimulus, he did it on health care, he did with Wall Street.
He does it with anybody who walks in with a deal. He doesn't know how to negotiate, he doesn't know how to walk away, he doesn't know how to say no, here's a line in the sand.
And I think that the House Democrats are finally standing up and saying, we stand for something and that's important. PARKER: You know who does know how to draw a line in the sand? I just want to say this.
SPITZER: Yes.
PARKER: With great admiration. Nonpartisan.
SPITZER: Yes.
PARKER: Nancy Pelosi.
SPITZER: That's right.
PARKER: You know, Nancy Pelosi is just -- she is -- she's the mama grizzly in this crowd, is she not?
SPITZER: Well, she --
PARKER: No, she's backing the caucus rather than the president. She's clearly made a choice.
SPITZER: Right. That is her job. And so I'm not surprised at some level she did that. But I think you're exactly right. When it came to health care, she is the one who puts some backbone in the White House that was wavering about what to do.
She is the one who has marshaled the Democrats in the House of Representatives throughout this process. And even at the moment of a lame duck Congress, she is saying we believe in something, we're going to act on it.
PARKER: Go, Nancy.
All right. For more on the Democrats open revolt, let's go to "Constitution Avenue".
Joining us now from Washington, a fierce critic of the president's tax cut deal, a Democratic senator, Sherrod Brown.
Welcome, Senator.
SEN. SHERROD BROWN (D), OHIO: Kathleen, thank you.
PARKER: So, Senator, in the bill's current form, will you vote for it?
BROWN: Unlikely. You know basically what we're doing here is we're borrowing $700 billion to the Chinese. We're charging it to our kids and grandkids' credit cards for them to pay off later and then we're giving that $700 billion to millionaires and billionaires.
It doesn't make fiscal sense. And this whole Bush economic policy of tax cuts for the rich and supposedly trickle down didn't work in the -- in the first part of this decade.
For the last 10 years, we've lost jobs. And that loss of jobs and that kind of economic policies doesn't work for our country. So this agreement needs to be better.
PARKER: Will you say -- the changes that are going to -- that would be made -- that could be made are not going to be big ones, most likely. So what changes, however minor, would you -- would do the trick for you? What would you go for?
BROWN: Well, there's some smaller things like energy tax credits and some things like that will matter to create jobs. And that's, to me, what all this should be about. And I think the House action today on some major issues, the House saying that they weren't going to bring it up, I hope gets everybody back to the table and really talking through some of these things.
I don't want a -- I don't want this deal to make it worse for dealing with the budget deficit. I don't want to make this -- to have this deal make it worse for our -- you know, what happens on job creation. So I think we need to just take our time.
And we have another 10 days, two weeks, to really figure this out and really bring people to the table and negotiate it.
SPITZER: You know, it seems to me, Senator, that you captured it exactly right. The president cut a deal that embraced the narrative of the Republican Party over the last 30 years. An economic narrative that has failed and caused incredibly disequilibrium and inequality in income distribution.
He bought the whole thing, hook, line and sinker. And I'm -- it's nice to see Democrats finally standing up and saying, we're not going to go for this. And so does the entire thing now -- can it now be renegotiated with the House having said, no deal. Now doesn't this open up everything for -- to be re-cut?
BROWN: I hope it does. I'm not clear yet on that. But when the president negotiated with Senate Republicans, he didn't include House Republicans, House Democrats or Senate Democrats. I mean Vice President Biden came to our caucus and explained what he had negotiated, basically, with Mitch McConnell. And that doesn't wash with a lot of us.
And as you said, Elliot, these Bush tax cuts in '01 and '03, the hallmark of his economic policies was tax cuts that went overwhelmingly to the wealthiest taxpayers under the theory of trickle down literally in Bush's eight years. We saw a net job, private sector job lost the eight years before with President Clinton with a different tax policy and different economic policy.
We saw 21 million private sector jobs gained. That's not -- that's not opinion, that's fact. And following that -- as you say, that narrative or that policy, continuing it doesn't make sense for our economy and our country, and doesn't make sense for our kids and grandkids because of the budget deficit.
SPITZER: It seems to me that in the past day we've heard both Larry Summers and the president say, pass this or else we'll have a double-dip recession. Seems to me that this is horrendous economics and even worse politics.
The pieces of the bill that you and others are in my view wisely objecting to do nothing for job creation. You know the estate tax provisions, which are harsh and the tax cuts for the rich which are a sure giveaway do not create a single job. We want to use that money, I would think, for something useful.
So I hope the president and Larry Summers will be called to the mat on this complete distortion of economics.
BROWN: Yes. Well, if we would follow what Mark Warner said, take some of the money that would have gone tax cuts for the rich and invest it in real job creation, partnerships, and tax cuts for the -- for small businesses and energy tax credits, some of those things, helping these companies that now have huge cash reserves, finding ways to encourage them to invest some of those cash reserves they're now holding and productive expansion of their operations, manufacturing or otherwise.
That the extending of unemployment benefits, that creates jobs, according to John McCain's economic adviser. That's the best money you put in an economy because it gets spent. It generates economic activity, ends up creating jobs.
Some of the other tax cuts that go to earned income tax credits and some of the money that goes to people that have kids in college. That's the kind of money that gets into the economy, as you suggest, and -- and generates economic activity and creates jobs. Not giving a millionaire an extra $40,000 that they don't really need as discretionary income and they're not likely to spend.
SPITZER: They are pitching this as a two-year extension of the tax cut for the wealthy. Yet it seems to be politically naive at best to see it that way. There will be a Republican House of Representatives two years from now, we already know that because of the elections.
The odds that that Republican House would increase taxes on the wealthy seems close to zero. So this, it seems to me, is almost in perpetuity extension of tax cut for the rich, which is going to cost us $1 trillion over the next decade. Am I wrong about that?
BROWN: Yes, you're right about that. I -- nobody really believes this is only a two-year extension of middle class tax cuts or the payroll tax holiday or the income tax cut or frankly the estate tax cut.
I don't think anybody thinks that's only a two-year extension. I think it's well into the future. Who knows how to predict, five or 10 years out?
SPITZER: Yes.
Senator Sherrod Brown, keep up the fight and thanks for joining us.
BROWN: Eliot, thanks. Kathleen, thank you.
PARKER: Thank you so much.
In just a minute, we'll talk with the Democratic congressman who stood to the White House and led the charge to keep the tax bill off the House floor.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. PETER DEFAZIO (D), OREGON: This was nearly unanimous in the Democratic caucus. I've been here 24 years. I don't know of another time when we would have even taken a vote in the caucus -- we're threatened before -- on a major policy pending issue and certainly never in defiance of something proposed by a president from our own party.
I think it's a pretty darn strong message.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PARKER: Defiant Democratic Congressman Pete DeFazio of Oregon led the Democratic revolt to keep the tax bill off the floor. He joins us tonight.
Welcome, Congressman.
DEFAZIO: Thank you.
PARKER: Thanks for joining us. So what changes have we made to this bill to get it to the floor?
DEFAZIO: The biggest issues were the massive cuts for estates over $10 million in value. There is still tremendous concern about not delivering on the promise of terminating the income tax cuts for income over $250,000 that President Obama has been talking about for two years.
People have concerns about the 100 percent expensing, with no requirement that all these corporations are sitting on piles of cash or quite profitable right now, that they would expend that money in a way that would create American jobs. That is, no buy America requirements. So there was discussion of that.
And then finally there's a lot of concern about this idea that we're going to reduce the Social Security tax and then the government is going to borrow the money, probably from China, and they are going to replace the money in the Social Security trust fund.
There are a lot of questions about breaking down the firewalls with Social Security and secondly there's -- you know those tax cuts go to everybody, including members of Congress, 2,000 bucks each, millionaires 2,000 bucks each with a reduction in the Social Security tax. We do not believe these are targeted things that will provide jobs. And we don't think they're fiscally responsible. This needs to be as small as possible, create as little debt and deficit as possible and produce the most possible jobs. And we don't think they're anywhere that combination.
PARKER: Well, this seems to be a terrible blow to the president and to his stature. Does he have any influence over Congress right now?
DEFAZIO: Well, look, you know, this -- we had a representative down at the White House who thought -- Chris Van Hollen -- that he was involved in the negotiations. He had been, you know, sent there at the request of the president. And what he found out was that there was a unilateral discussion between the vice president and Mitch McConnell, the Republican minority leader of the Senate who designed the package, while he was in what he thought were negotiations.
You know we think we can get a much better package and not the Mitch McConnell Republican minority package from the Senate.
SPITZER: You know, Congressman, I got to say, I look at all this and I just see the worse form of a bad, weak negotiating I've ever seen from the White House, which of course we've seen over the past two years and I see the wholesale embrace of George Bush's theory of economics.
And it just seems to me it's time -- and I applaud you for doing this. It's time for the Democrats in the House to stand up and say no, we elected a president who believed in certain things. We're going to fight for them.
Where is the fight in this White House? It seems they cave to pragmatism. They didn't -- we're not taken hostage. They turned themselves in and said, please, take us hostage.
Who is going to inject some fight into the veins of the folks in the White House?
DEFAZIO: Well, that -- that's what I hoped this -- this was nearly unanimous in the Democratic caucus. I have been here 24 years. I don't know of another time when we would have even taken a vote in the caucus. We've threatened before on a major policy pending issue and certainly never in defiance of something proposed by a president from our own party.
I think it's a pretty darn strong message. I heard some people now at the White House blowing it off, saying no, it doesn't mean much, it's not binding. Tell you what, all our leadership was in the room. They heard what we said. And they heard that 99 percent of the caucus was on board with this is not an acceptable package.
I mean if you think the economics of the last eight years have worked, great, that is supply side, trickle down, this would be even more supply side and even more trickle down and I don't think it's going to produce the results that this president wants or needs in terms of putting people back to work.
I mean he's had a failed economic team and this is more mush from that same failed economic team.
PARKER: What's your take on Larry Summers' warning that this -- without passage of this package, we'll go into a recession again?
DEFAZIO: Larry has done a great job so far. Remember, he cut out real investment and real jobs out of the stimulus in order to give people a miniscule tax cut that they don't know they got so that they would spend it on consumer goods. And theoretically, that was going to put people back to work.
I argued about -- with him about that two years ago. I said bad politics, bad economics. And it was both. And this is just a continuation of his failed policies.
We need real investment. We need to put people back to work. And I don't believe that this melee of tax cuts is going to get us to that point. And I just don't believe Larry Summers. We can get a much better deal for the taxpayer and the American people and something better for the economy.
SPITZER: You know, it's amazing to me they're trying to pitch this as somehow a two-year deal, only a two-year deal. In two years, we can refight this fight. The fact of the matter is, they know as well as we do, the House will be Republican two years from now as this past November's elections determined.
The possibility of repealing or reinstating the higher tax rates for the wealthiest people in this America is close to zero at that point in time. This is a decade-long decision they're making costing us a trillion dollars. They're going to turn around in January and say we've got to balance the budget, take all this money out of the things that would be investments for the future.
How -- do they think they're just going to pull the wool over the eyes of Americans who believe in investing for the future?
DEFAZIO: I don't know. Perhaps the White House is believing its own message. But we were told yesterday by the vice president, he guaranteed that this would end in two years and that the president would stand up against continuation.
I find that hard to believe. I remember the president guaranteed or campaigned two years on ending these tax cuts. These are even more generous than the tax cuts he wanted to end because we have this new -- you know new reduction in taxes for estates over $10 million that was never even envisioned.
So I -- you know, I just can't believe that in an election year, in a campaign, he is going to go out and campaign against continuing the tax cuts. You know I find that hard to believe.
SPITZER: Yes.
PARKER: OK. Representative Peter DeFazio, thank you so much for giving us the latest news.
DEFAZIO: Thank you.
SPITZER: Next, compromise or cornered, which is it for President Obama? We'll be right back.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NICK GILLESPIE, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, REASON.COM: Are we injecting more or less certainty into the economy? And even the way Obama is talking here, I would be in favor of extending the Bush rates indefinitely or settling on rates that we say are going to be done indefinitely.
To say we're going to extend them for two more years so we can have a really big showdown in a presidential year is not good.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: A showdown within the Democratic Party continues. House Democrats are now keeping the president's newly negotiated tax bill from even getting to the floor.
PARKER: The president takes a lot on this compromise, arguing the economic recovery would suffer if all the tax cuts expired. Today, he reiterated the warning. Let's listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There is an important debate I think most of you are aware of on Capitol Hill that will determine, in part, whether our economy moves forward or backward.
The bipartisan framework that we've forged on taxes will not only protect working Americans from seeing a major tax increase on January 1st, it will provide businesses, incentives to invest, grow and hire.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
SPITZER: Joining us now to talk about this backlash, editor-in- chief of Reason.com, Nick Gillespie, and from "Mother Jones" magazine, David Corn.
Welcome to both of you.
It seems to me the president and Larry Summers the day before tried to take the American public hostage by saying -- by threatening a double-dip if we don't buy into this horrendous tax deal that he cut, basically becoming George W. Bush in my mind.
Agree or disagree?
DAVID CORN, MOTHER JONES MAGAZINE: Well, I was in the White House press briefing yesterday when Larry Summers came out and said, if you don't do this, we'll have a double-dip recession. I mean it was one of these "whoa" moments.
SPITZER: Yes.
CORN: It was very ratcheting up there. And, you know, I hate to say this, but I don't believe there'll be a double-dip recession. I mean who knows? But if nothing is passed, he's right. And the president is right.
(CROSSTALK)
CORN: If there's nothing --
SPITZER: Right.
CORN: If there is nothing, then we'll likely to have an economic impact that will be negative. That will be bad. So --
GILLESPIE: Why?
CORN: Why?
GILLESPIE: Yes, I mean, if --
CORN: Because -- if taxes do go up --
GILLESPIE: Right.
CORN: -- and there is no unemployment -- extending of unemployment benefits, then you're going to have the economy just continuing along as it's going, which I don't think you're probably happy with. Or maybe you are. I don't know.
(CROSSTALK)
GILLESPIE: Interestingly, I'll match Larry Summers with yesterday I talked to David Stockman, right, this budget director, who strangely for a libertarian-small government-Republican, he's in favor of having all of the tax cuts expire because he thinks that we shouldn't be financing future debt with --
CORN: But he's a true deficit hawk.
GILLESPIE: Yes.
CORN: I'll give him credit for that. Unlike any Republican --
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: He may be right because the marginal rate increase may not be such a terrible thing in the grand scale of --
(CROSSTALK)
GILLESPIE: Actually, I think it would be terrible but he's also right that the bulk of the money would be in taxing people under that top 3 percent. That's where 3.2 trillion out of about 3.9 trillion come from.
SPITZER: That's over in 10 years.
GILLESPIE: Yes, over in 10-year time frame. I think the real question is, are we injecting more or less certainty into the economy? And even the way Obama is talking here, I would be in favor of extending the Bush rates indefinitely or settling on rates that we say are going to be done indefinitely.
To say we're going to extend them for two more years so we can have a really big showdown in a presidential year is not good. To say we're going to have a stimulus or a tax holiday for a little while, these are not the types of steps that will allow people to take a deep breath and say, I'm a business owner, I'm going to invest. I'm a homeowner or I'm a renter, and I'm going to buy.
CORN: But part of the --
GILLESPIE: We need stability and a framework that will allow people to navigate the future.
CORN: Stimulus has worked this past year.
GILLESPIE: How do you --
CORN: And it's getting -- well, you may not agree --
(CROSSTALK)
CORN: Ask any major mainstream economist.
GILLESPIE: Ask any major Democrat.
CORN: No, no, no.
(CROSSTALK)
CORN: Excuse me. Is Mark Zandy a Democrat?
GILLESPIE: Mark Zandy is --
(CROSSTALK)
CORN: Well, actually, he -- maybe not because he was John McCain's adviser.
GILLESPIE: Absolutely.
(CROSSTALK)
CORN: Listen. Listen.
GILLESPIE: I think you've ever heard anything coming from me. CORN: Two to three million jobs created or saved, because -- you know, you can roll your eyes but -- I know your view, Nick, which is libertarian.
GILLESPIE: Yes.
CORN: You don't want to have any government intervention and just let it roll and see what happens. Now that's good maybe for you and I, but for the bulk of working Americans out there, that's a pretty risky give.
GILLESPIE: What we saw with the stimulus funds, for instance, is that they were used to keep people on the public sector payroll. When the stimulus funds wore out --
CORN: Oh my goodness.
GILLESPIE: -- then people start getting fired from state jobs. OK?
CORN: But you don't want firefighters and teachers and --
GILLESPIE: Yes. That's exactly right.
(CROSSTALK)
CORN: -- working as long as possible?
GILLESPIE: Because here -- here's the question for you. Since Bill Clinton left office, federal outlays have gone up 60 percent in real terms, in 2010 dollars. What I would argue is like -- OK, let's make a bargain with the country and say, we're going to return the level of government spending and government services to what you had in 2000.
Could you live with that? Don't you remember we were all wearing pickle barrels and we had to forage in dumpsters for food? No, not at all.
CORN: The biggest uptake was from -- you know the Republican.
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: OK. Time is short. I want to switch this from the pure economics to the political.
The House is now in open revolt against the president.
CORN: Yes.
SPITZER: Does this mean that the president is now fundamentally weakened? He can't speak for a unified Democratic Party as we go forward.
PARKER: Nick, you think it's good for him. GILLESPIE: Well, I -- actually I think that what he is -- you know, the birdie whispering in his ears is Hillary Clinton and saying, do what Bill Clinton did in the middle of his first disastrous term.
What Barack Obama has realized, I suspect, is that his future is not contingent upon the Democratic Party. It's about getting a second term. And he can run against his own party and he can be seen as an independent. Whether that works or not, but I assume that --
(CROSSTALK)
PARKER: Well, he's got to get the centrists and the moderates back in his camp.
GILLESPIE: Right.
PARKER: And this is the way you do it.
GILLESPIE: Possible.
CORN: Let me -- let me take the naive position if I may. And that is, I do think that when you have the call to make and when he -- I've talked to people around him and got a sense of how -- the questions he's been asking in the conversations they've had up to this, is I do think he feels somewhat of an obligation to middle class and low-income Americans to try to get something done and resolved quickly and not to have the risk of the fight, which you and I and others probably wanted to have maybe months ago, not in this particular month.
And so I think it's not just Bill Clinton strategic triangulation for political sense, political reasons, I think there is a conscientiousness that's also factoring in.
SPITZER: They certainly should have resolved this months ago when they had the political power to do it.
CORN: Yes.
GILLESPIE: They should have -- might have also passed a budget which is still --
SPITZER: That's right. I agree with you. And they certainly shouldn't have waited until the end and then caved in the last moment because you don't announce to the world I'm so desperate for resolution, therefore, I will agree to anything.
CORN: Right.
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: That's not negotiating. They're just caving.
CORN: You know, but so -- I mean that argues to the point that they're not the great political calculators.
(CROSSTALK)
CORN: But this may not just be Hillary Clinton's -- you know, master plan here to triangulate --
(CROSSTALK)
GILLESPIE: Yes, I mean, I think Obama --
CORN: -- and have a few liberal Democrats in the House.
GILLESPIE: I think Obama is becoming more Machiavellian and I don't consider Machiavelli in the negative term.
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: Let me ask this question. Has he sacrificed -- being a transformative president for being reelected --
GILLESPIE: No, you know, let's -- I'll go on record and say, Herbert Hoover was a transformative president. So it's like you can always -- you know, your party loyalty is not what makes you transformative or not.
SPITZER: I am not talking about party loyalty, I'm talking conceding the bigger issues in terms of --
GILLESPIE: No -- well, no, I don't think so. And I don't think anything Obamacare could conceivably be transformative and I think overwhelmingly in a negatively way. I don't think this tax battle is transformative.
SPITZER: Nick and David, thank you so much for coming by. We will continue this, we promise.
PARKER: Coming up, Prince Charles and Camilla caught in the middle of frenzied student demonstrations in London. We'll have the latest from across the pond. Stay with us.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LAURIE DAVID, CLIMATE CHANGE ACTIVIST: I think modern life is tearing us apart. Everything about our culture today is sort of, you know, putting up into separate corners and we have to hold on to the rituals and the things that bring us back together and every day gives us an opportunity to sit down and connect with each other at dinner.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: As producer of "An Inconvenient Truth," Laurie David has done as much as anyone to bring global warming to the public's attention. In her new book "The Family Dinner: Great Ways to Connect with Your Kids One Meal at a Time," she gives overwhelmed families all the tools they need to create their own family dinner rituals. Hi, Laurie. And full disclosure, you have been a friend, somebody I have respected for years and years and years. Thank you for being here.
LAURIE DAVID, CLIMATE CHANGE ACTIVIST: Thank you so much. A friend of both of yours.
KATHLEEN PARKER, HOST: Yes, thank you so much. I'm a friend of Laurie David, too. Anyway, I'm thrilled that you've done this cookbook. Most people would say, why do we need a cookbook to teach us how to have family dinners? Isn't that a normal thing? But the truth is family dinners have fallen out of vogue.
DAVID: Right.
PARKER: And they're so important teaching children everything from nutrition to manners to social values.
DAVID: I mean, the truth is everything a parent worries about, from drugs to alcohol, to self-esteem to academic achievement can all be improved by sitting down to regular meals. And it's really -- the research is staggering. I mean, there's tons of research on this. So I think modern life is tearing us apart. Everything about our culture today is sort of, you know, putting us into separate corners. And we have to hold on to the rituals and the things that bring us back together. And every day gives us an opportunity to sit down and connect with each other at dinner.
PARKER: Well, you and your former husband, the comedian, Larry David, have made it a point of getting together for these family meals. How hard is that?
DAVID: Well, here's the thing. First of all, half of all marriages end up in divorce. OK. So that's an awful lot of rituals and danger of falling by the wayside just when we need them the most. And when we split up, I insisted on continuing to have dinner. And it wasn't easy, but I write about it in the book. I, every day at 5:00, I would call friends or family. I would beg them to come have dinner with us because the more people at the table --
SPITZER: And the kids.
DAVID: And the kids.
SPITZER: Right.
DAVID: It would alleviate the pressure. But eventually, I started inviting Larry to the table. And I think, you know --
SPITZER: As the kid, or he's the --
DAVID: Well, he's kind of one of the kids. But eventually, he said yes. And that was the great thing. It was the table and this ritual that brought us all back together. And all these verbal games that we play at my house that are all in the book, he started coming to dinner. SPITZER: So do you talk about the drugs and the social issues, or do you kind of come at it from a more oblique angle?
DAVID: What I like to do is play games like verbal games and to do things that so that everyone is having fun. I mean, you want to avoid this thing that happens, like how was your day? Fine. And I have teenagers now.
SPITZER: That sounds like our dinner table sometimes.
DAVID: Exactly. I'm sure you have a great dinner table because you have three daughters and I'm sure they're fantastic.
SPITZER: They all talk.
DAVID: They all talk.
SPITZER: Right.
DAVID: But you know, the conversation is just as important as the food so I put a lot of emphasis on that.
SPITZER: Do you talk politics?
DAVID: Yes.
SPITZER: So you're --
DAVID: Politics are great to talk about. First of all, I interviewed a lot of people for this book and I've all this little side bars of wisdom from other people. And I can't tell you how many people told me that their whole social conscience was formed at the dinner table.
SPITZER: That is where you can get kids interested in things beyond just what their friends are talking about.
DAVID: Exactly.
SPITZER: The larger issue. So I'm going to do that with our dinner table right here. And I've got to ask you -- I've got to ask you, use that segue back to because as we introduced you --
PARKER: That was smooth. That was very clever.
SPITZER: You changed the world and I really mean that in terms --
DAVID: No, Eliot, that's too generous.
SPITZER: Well, the "Inconvenient Truth" was that critical movie that captured an issue and said to the world, pay attention. How did you first care? What brought you to care about environmental issues and global warning?
DAVID: It's funny, but it's the same thing that happened with this. I had an epiphany when I became a mom. I saw everyone driving by in SUVs and all the people, all my friends were driving them and we were, you know, I considered us a little educated on these issues. And I became panicked as a mother. What was going to happen if we, you know, don't do something about this problem? So that, it was the same thing that brought me to an epiphany of that at the dinner table and how important that is.
PARKER: Well, I met you in 2005 when you were starting your virtual march. And you had one of the first people to sign up I think was Senator John McCain.
DAVID: Yes.
PARKER: And what has happened to that passion?
DAVID: What has happened to the passion of people trying to do something about global warming?
PARKER: Yes.
DAVID: Well, it's very interesting to talk about right now because I'm, of course, upset about how little progress we're making. And I just think that the forces against change are so strong, so rich, so powerful, so organized and they are continuing to keep the public confused and misinformed about this issue. And we're like frozen. We're frozen in place.
SPITZER: Virtually all of the Republicans who were just elected to Congress disavowed the science of global warming. It is as though we become (INAUDIBLE) and we just don't want to look at science anymore. It's scary.
DAVID: Well, I don't understand when that happened, when science became something you believe in, like do you believe in global warming? I don't understand that.
SPITZER: Right. Right.
DAVID: Facts are facts. And, you know, this is a crazy thing that's happened in our culture.
SPITZER: Right.
DAVID: And, you know, before it's too late, by the way, look at the weather. Look at -- you know, how many more extreme floods and crazy droughts and all the things that are happening around the world, this is exactly what the scientists said would happen?
SPITZER: President Obama, when he was elected, we had such passion and such excitement and such energy for everything he was going to do. And I think, we, I at least, don't talk for anybody else. Now look at what's happening and say, oh, my goodness, what happened? How do you feel? You are his base. You were the sort of intellectual, media savvy intelligentsia that was with him saying, yes, Barack, you will change the world. What happened here?
DAVID: Well, first of all, because I'm an environmentalist, I'm an optimist. Right?
SPITZER: Good. OK.
DAVID: SO all environmentalists are optimists. So I am hopeful that there's something like just around the corner that I'm not aware of strategically that he is going to, you know, surprise us and help solve some of the problems that we're facing.
SPITZER: Right. And if I told you we had a mirror up there I was looking around the corner and it looked awfully dark and bleak. I just see Republican -- I see Mitch McConnell looking at me.
DAVID: Well, that's not Obama's fault with Mitch McConnell.
SPITZER: Right.
DAVID: But --
SPITZER: But why could he not have sort of summoned up all the oratorical skills he had during the campaign and continued to drive forward?
DAVID: You know what, it's tough out there. There's a lot of money fighting him. There's a lot of, again, it's the same thing as the global warming thing.
SPITZER: Yes.
DAVID: The enemy is organized and very rich.
PARKER: Laurie David, thanks so much for being with us.
DAVID: Thank you so much for having me.
SPITZER: When we come back, one week, we hear he's taking bags of money from Iran. Then next week, we hear he's a statesman. Will the real Hamid Karzai please stand up?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES TRAUB, AUTHOR/JOURNALIST: We have a doctrine to fight this war, this counterinsurgency idea, which depends on having legitimate governance. How can you do that if you have someone who is seen by his own people as corrupt, ineffective and indifferent to their welfare?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: If America is going to get out of Afghanistan, the strategy goes, President Karzai is cheating (ph) in getting the Afghans in shape to control their own country. Since he took power in 2001, the Karzai government has been plagued with widespread corruption from election fraud to receiving bags of cash from Iran. After the release of WikiLeaks documents describing Karzai as paranoid and weak, Karzai responded by supporting the U.S. after which U.S. Defense Secretary Gates called him a statesman if you can believe that.
PARKER: Well, today, the defense secretary was in Abu Dhabi where he also -- we also know from WikiLeaks, what did we ever know before WikiLeaks that there is fear of a nuclear Iran that mirrors the Middle East concerns over Israel? Here to discuss the security issues is James Traub, contributing writer for the "New York Times" magazine.
Thank you for coming, James.
JAMES TRAUB, AUTHOR/JOURNALIST: Well, a pleasure.
PARKER: So Karzai, statesman, crazy person?
TRAUB: Paranoid and weak. A fairly accurate description, I think. Remember he said, if you guys don't comply with what I want, I'm going to join the Taliban.
PARKER: Right. Sure.
TRAUB: So, you know, we have a doctrine to fight this war, this counterinsurgency idea which depends on having legitimate governance. How can you do that if you have someone who is seen by his own people as corrupt, ineffective and indifferent to their welfare? That is what we have?
SPITZER: Well, Gates -- actually listen to the sound bite of Gates. You've got to see this to appreciate how deeply we are now enmeshed with this guy. Let's watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERT GATES, DEFENSE SECRETARY: I would say that the WikiLeaks' revelation of all of these documents is extraordinarily embarrassing for the United States. But at the end of the day, nations and leaders make decisions based on their interests. And I would say that America's best partners and friends, and I include among them, President Karzai, have responded to this, in my view, in an extraordinarily statesmanlike way.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PARKER: That was not a convincing statement.
TRAUB: He responded very mildly and blithely . But the fact is half the American policymakers who deal with this guy can't even talk to him anymore. They have such bad relations.
PARKER: I think Ambassador --
TRAUB: Ambassador --
PARKER: -- Eikenberry was there kind of in the front row. He and Karzai have been at it like cats and dogs.
TRAUB: Yes.
PARKER: And legitimately so, he needs to listen to it. Listen to this. What bothers me so much about what Gates said in that clip is that it seems to me a premonition of what the White House is going to do with its mandatory December review of strategy. They're trying to pretend and persuade us we're winning when we're not.
TRAUB: Yes.
SPITZER: And I just see us digging ourselves deeper, sinking into the quicksand. And I just don't see them coming to grips with the harsh realities of the situation.
TRAUB: No. Obama has made a commitment. His commitment is until 2014. We're going to keep our soldiers there.
Now, is it unimaginable that this thing that he's opposing would work? That is to say our military will conquer more and more areas and they will be able to turn more and more areas over to Afghan security forces. I don't think it's impossible. I just think it's really unlikely. And I think that the expenditure of blood and treasure for such an unlikely outcome just makes it not worthwhile. But no, Obama has made the decision. And yes, we're going to hear good news in the December review. We're moving towards our goals.
PARKER: But what would you recommend? If the president asked your opinion, what would you say would be the best route for us at this point?
TRAUB: I would begin by saying they're all bad. So whatever I said is the least bad. And so I think what I would say is probably what Joe Biden and others had recommended back in the summer of 2009, which is a more limited operation, which focuses on protecting a small number of major urban areas doesn't try to really transform large parts of the countryside of Afghanistan, keeps up a large counter terror operation in Afghanistan, as well as a big operation in Pakistan. Not so much military but the drones, as well as the big civilian operation. But I do think that the counterinsurgency strategy which involves changing the governance of Afghanistan, it may work in a small number of places. It's not going to work I think in the ambitious way we're trying to do it now.
SPITZER: Can we switch countries and region.
TRAUB: Yes.
SPITZER: Just go over to the other hot spot of the week where the conversations, the talks, I don't know what you call them with Iran over nuclear weapons and their development of nuclear power and their enrichment, they now have admitted they have yellowcake. They announced it with some great pride, the stuff in the early stages of uranium to be enriched into what could be used either for peaceful or military purposes. The talks with the multilateral group in Geneva that just went nowhere. Even the diplomats said this is a complete waste of time.
TRAUB: Right.
SPITZER: What's happening there now?
TRAUB: I think Obama deserves more credit on this one. I mean, one thing we've learned from the WikiLeaks strategy is that he has succeeded in bringing around a lot of countries to his point of view. So both China and Russia, which were very reluctant to engage in any kind of sanctions have agreed. We now see that all of these Middle Eastern countries, the Emirates, other gulf countries are just as worried about Iran, or more so. It's their neighborhood. So he hasn't done anything which is a solution, but what are the solutions? I think --
SPITZER: That's the real question. What do you do as the clock runs?
TRAUB: Right. So, you know, the two attractive ones are kind of everything and nothing. Which is to say attack them. We'll have Israel attack them. That's one. The opposite is let's just accept the legitimacy of their own wishes and deal with them like any other country. I think both -- I think attack them is a terrible idea. It would be a catastrophe. I don't think Iran is going to respond to those, you know, we're not going to accuse you of anything anymore, that view. You have no choice but to try to keep tightening the screws on them even as you hold open the possibility for some kind of (INAUDIBLE). I don't think they'll take. I think Iran feels like having the ability to threaten the nuclear attack is profoundly in their interest. And so, I think the big question is, is there going to be a point where we say, you can't go beyond that and we really mean it. And if you do, then the military option is back on the table.
PARKER: James Traub, thanks so much for joining us.
TRAUB: Well, thank you. My pleasure.
PARKER: Interesting as always.
SPITZER: Coming up, massive protests in Britain over tuition hikes and a showdown in parliament. We'll ask "Our Political Party" what is happening to the British empire.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHARLES BLOW, "NEW YORK TIMES" VISUAL OP-ED COLUMNIST: When you see young people across the world, whether it be there, France or in Iran, when you see injustice, just the amount of political engagement among college age students. College students are a constituency that people fear riling in other countries. What has happened to the civic engagement for college students in this country?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: Welcome to "Our Political Party," where we invite a variety of people to speak their minds about what's going on. Let's meet tonight's guest. S.E. Cupp is a conservative blogger, co-author of the book "Why You're Wrong About the Right." I don't think I have it. That's all right. I'll let you slide on that.
PARKER: Charles Blow is a visual op-ed columnist of "The New York Times" and Chrystia Freeland is the global is the global editor- at-large for Reuters.
Welcome, everybody.
OK, the big news is rioting in London. People are going nuts because they've tripled the tuition. They even attacked the car of Prince Charles and Camilla.
SPITZER: Now, they're serious.
PARKER: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Now, they can attack Prince William.
SPITZER: Yes, that's right.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That would be serious.
SPITZER: That's right.
PARKER: But seriously, what's going on over there and where is the passion over here?
S.E. CUPP, CO-AUTHOR, "WHY YOU'RE WRONG ABOUT THE RIGHT": It's really interesting. I mean, here, you know, if you look at the Tea Party, for example, people are galvanizing, trying to get the government to spend less. And just across the pond, they are protesting to get the government to spend more.
In their defense, going from 4,000 to 14,000 in a year, that is a huge leap. They should learn from us and go a little bit more sort of incrementally especially when it comes to college. But I think the bottom line here, the lesson here is, not everyone gets to go to college. Not everyone should have the right to go to college.
CHRYSTIA FREELAND, GLOBAL EDITOR AT LARGE, REUTERS: Not everybody benefits from college.
CUPP: You need people to learn -- yes, I mean --
SPITZER: Wow.
FREELAND: S.E., look at the difference.
(CROSSTALK)
FREELAND: No, no, but it's --
SPITZER: This is the right. We just heard it.
CUPP: There you go.
FREELAND: No, but that's not even the bottom line for the right. I mean, the debate in Britain right now isn't about whether they have too many people going to college. The debate in Britain right now, is there huge austerity program which is incredibly severe and actually, you know, drawing comparisons between the public in the U.S. and the U.K. is pretty misleading because the British government is embarked on sort of an unprecedented experiment for an industrialized developed nation. In budget cutting, they have cut nearly 20 percent of the budget. And these riots, you ain't seen nothing yet. The main cuts are going to fall in the first quarter of next year and you are going to see hundreds of thousands of government workers --
SPITZER: Yes.
FREELAND: And it's actually it's not clear if it's going to work or not. I mean, look at what's happening in Ireland. Some of the skeptics have started to be won over and have said, you know what? That was maybe the right thing to do and --
CUPP: But it was Britain -- hugely expansive government to a very limited government in the summer.
FREELAND: Wait a minute, S.E. You have to actually look at what the neighborhood is. And the neighborhood is a Europe where there is huge currency volatility where you are seeing sovereign debt crises falling like dominoes. You have Greece. Now you have Ireland. People are predicting you'll have Portugal and Spain. So it's a really tense situation.
PARKER: We're going to have to do budgets cut here. We're going to have to do severe cutting as Eliot has pushed everyone in the show to declare. So are we looking forward to this? Is this what's going to happen here?
CHARLES BLOW, "NEW YORK TIMES" VISUAL OP-ED COLUMNIST: I don't believe that's true. And, in fact, I find it very interesting, even beyond England when you see young people across the world, whether it be there, France or in Iran, when you see injustice, just the amount of political engagement among college age students. College students are a constituency that people fear riling in other countries.
What has happened to the civic engagement for college students in this country? I'm not saying that they have to go to the streets and throw bricks. I do feel like at some point that the Tea Party can't all be 45 to 60 years old or that, you know, the only way you can get people to the mall, if you yank them to the mall is you have a comedian invite them. At some point, you have to say, this is your country. Do you care?
PARKER: I have a theory about that. I think social media has diffused passion. In other words, people can go online and vent their spleens. And so they no longer have to hit the streets the way did.
SPITZER: I think the opposite. I think it actually is an organized -- PARKER: Well, you can organize the country but it's not --
SPITZER: -- meet ups and mobile organizations. I think what happened is that during the '08 campaign, college age students did have this enormous excitement and it dissipated.
PARKER: Right.
SPITZER: I want to -- can we switch gears? I want to come back to your newspaper for a minute.
BLOW: OK.
SPITZER: A United States senator no less has accused "The New York times" of possibly committing a crime on publishing the WikiLeaks stuff. I know you're not a voice for the times, but is this crazy? I mean, is publishing this stuff --
BLOW: You can name the senator.
SPITZER: It was Joe Lieberman. It was Joe Lieberman. Joe Lieberman said, you know, he said, you guys possibly should be prosecuted, which I think is crazy. But how do you respond as a voice for the media?
BLOW: Well, I mean, I'm sure that Bill Keller stays up late night worrying about what Joe Lieberman thinks about what "The New York Times" does.
CUPP: Well, he did comment on it.
BLOW: Bill comments on a lot of things. I think that what the "Times" did in this case, and I have no dealings with it whatsoever -- the meetings. What they did in this case was incredibly responsible. And I think, in fact, may have helped some things not to be published. They sifted through the data, took out some things, talked to the Obama administration, listened to what they wanted to take out and the administration said, can you please take this back and share it with WikiLeaks? So they did that and they believe that some of that may have stopped some of the things from being published. This idea that you have to put some muzzle on the media, this was going to come out anyway. They were going to publish. They're probably going to publish more things than they ended up publishing.
SPITZER: We've got to take a quick break. We'll be right back with more of "Our Political Party" in just a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, I'm Randi Kaye. More of "PARKER SPITZER" in a moment. First, the very latest.
House Democrats are defying President Obama in the tax cut bill. Their caucus voted today not to bring the package to a vote. They don't like the deal the president made with Republicans to extend the Bush era tax cuts. In London, students in the streets protesting a parliament vote to raise tuition at universities. Demonstrators attacked a car carrying Prince Charles and Camilla. Neither was hurt.
The fate of the man accused of kidnapping Elizabeth Smart is in the hand of a Utah jury now. Brian David Mitchell is legally insane or a cold calculated kidnapper.
Back on the Hill, the Senate rejected a bid to open debate on "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." Did petty politics and procedures play a part? We're keeping them honest tonight on "360."
That is the very latest. Now back to "PARKER SPITZER."
PARKER: Welcome back to "Our Political Party." We're going to continue our conversation about WikiLeaks. I read Bill Keller, the editor's letter to the public explaining how they got to the point where they decided to run certain documents and not others. I thought it demonstrated a very responsible approach. And I hope that the public notices the distinction between a legitimate news organization that really takes the trouble to figure out what's responsible, what's not and other just random blogs that will print anything.
BLOW: I think that's right. And even further than that, I hope that the public realizes what's happening in the world of information in the same way that the public had to get used to the idea that there was no such thing as being no absolute privacy. We have to get used to the idea that there's no such thing as absolute secrecy anymore.
FREELAND: Not so much the public, Charles. And I think the public actually gets that. Look at how much people voluntarily reveal on Facebook. I think it's government officials and companies that really need to understand, you know, if it's an electronic form, people are going to have access to it. If you want it to be really, really secret, you're going to have to develop new protocols.
SPITZER: S.E., your view on this.
CUPP: What's missing from this conversation is the fact that "The New York Times" and full disclosure, I was employed for eight years there, had an ideological reason to public these WikiLeaks documents. And if we're going to applaud them --
FREELAND: Even if they hate Obama?
CUPP: I'll finish. I'll finish. I'll let you know. If we're to applaud them for publishing the WikiLeaks documents, then we have to scold them for failing to publish the climate-gate document.
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: First Amendment rights don't hinge upon ideology. First Amendment rights --
CUPP: We're not talking about rights. I'm talking about an editorial decision. SPITZER: No, your public rights.
FREELAND: Let's talk about facts as well because "The New York Times" did report on the so-called climate e-mail.
SPITZER: Indeed, it did.
CUPP: They wrote an op-ed.
FREELAND: No, they didn't. They also wrote news stories about those e-mails.
CUPP: There is a huge double standard. If we're all going to pretend it's not there, I should know. I can live in la la land as well.
SPITZER: All right. Chrystia, S.E. and Charles Blow, thank you so much for being with us. This will continue. I think now we do understand the right, indeed. I think I do understand it.
CUPP: I represent no one.
PARKER: Well, thanks, everybody, for joining us. Good night from New York. "LARRY KING LIVE" starts right now.
