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Speaker 1: On this episode of Newsworld. On Thursday, January nineteenth, the

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Speaker 1: US Treasury Department announced the United States has reached its

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Speaker 1: debt limit and they would begin a series of accounting

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Speaker 1: measures to keep the United States from breaching its borrowing cap.

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Speaker 1: Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen sent a letter of Congressional leadership

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Speaker 1: about the dead limits, saying quote, Dear mister Speaker, I

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Speaker 1: write to keep you apprized of actions the Treasury Department

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Speaker 1: is taking in regard to the deadloment. In my letter

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Speaker 1: of January thirteenth, twenty twenty three, I noted that Public

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Speaker 1: Law one seventeen seventy three increased the statutory debt limit

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Speaker 1: to a level of thirty one point three eight one

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Speaker 1: trillion dollars, and inform you the beginning on January nineteenth,

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Speaker 1: the outstanding debt of the United States was projected to

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Speaker 1: reach the statutory limit. This letter serves to notify you,

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Speaker 1: pursuant to five USC. Eighty three forty eight one two

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Speaker 1: of the extraordinary measures Treasury began using today. She concludes

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Speaker 1: by saying, quote, I respectfully urged Congress to act promptly

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Speaker 1: to protect the full faith and credit of the United States.

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Speaker 1: So as we approached the debt ceiling debate, I felt

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Speaker 1: strongly it's important we know the history of our national debt,

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Speaker 1: how we got to thirty one point three trillion dollars

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Speaker 1: of national debts to day, and what we should be

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Speaker 1: doing about it. So I'm really pleased to welcome back

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Speaker 1: my guest, Thomas Hunting. He is the former vice chairman

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Speaker 1: of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, former president and CEO

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Speaker 1: of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. He was

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Speaker 1: with the Federal Reserve for thirty eight years. He is

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Speaker 1: currently a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Macadis Center at

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Speaker 1: George Mason University. Tom, welcome back, and thank thank you

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Speaker 1: for joining me again on News World. Thank you for

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Speaker 1: having me. It's good to be back, and interesting topic.

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Speaker 1: As I'll say, you know so much more about this

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Speaker 1: than I do. That I'm really grateful because I think

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Speaker 1: all of our listeners will find this to be a

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Speaker 1: very informative an educational conversation. So could you start with

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Speaker 1: sort of a history of the national debt? Well, it's

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Speaker 1: pretty straightforward. The Congress allocates spending, the Executive branch signs

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Speaker 1: the bill, and we have a new spending bill, and

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Speaker 1: it's more than the revenues that will generate through their

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Speaker 1: tax program and deficit results, and the deficit has to

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Speaker 1: be funded. Now traditionally, when you do that, you have

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Speaker 1: to go to the private sector and borrow those funds,

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Speaker 1: and that puts up with pressure on interest rates as

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Speaker 1: you take resources from the private sector, and that causes

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Speaker 1: the public and everyone to become to realize that debt

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Speaker 1: isn't free, and therefore you have to find ways to

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Speaker 1: address it going forward in terms of whether you're going

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Speaker 1: to watch your spending and or your tax system. What

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Speaker 1: I think has happened actually even before the pandemic over

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Speaker 1: the last more than a decade, because in twenty seven,

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Speaker 1: twenty eight, twenty nine, the deficit in the United States

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Speaker 1: was roughly let's say, ten or eleven trillion dollars. Now

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Speaker 1: we're at thirty one point three eight one trillion dollars.

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Speaker 1: You know that something has gone out. And that's something

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Speaker 1: I think is any kind of external discipline on the government,

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Speaker 1: the House, the Senate, and the administration to kind of

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Speaker 1: watch the spending and watch the revenues to make sure

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Speaker 1: there's some balance there. I understand deficits are sometimes necessary,

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Speaker 1: but in the long term you need to address those

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Speaker 1: to make sure they don't get out of hand. And

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Speaker 1: the absence of discipline is there is no longer an

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Speaker 1: external standard in terms of the demand for our debt.

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Speaker 1: We are the reserve currency, so it's allowed us to

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Speaker 1: issue this debt globally. The monetary policy authority has kept

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Speaker 1: the borrowing costs so attractive that the government has felt

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Speaker 1: very free to borrow more money, and it has and

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Speaker 1: the Congress itself, and I mean both parties. If the

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Speaker 1: Democrats want to spend more money, and though they can't

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Speaker 1: get tax increases, they spend it anyway. The Republicans do

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Speaker 1: not want tax increases and can't stop the spending increases,

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Speaker 1: or won't you end up with ever greater taxes. Plus

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Speaker 1: two thirds of the spending budget is in entitlements, which

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Speaker 1: are indexed to inflation. They're mandatory spending their index, so

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Speaker 1: the spending is going to grow. If you're going to

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Speaker 1: address this issue long term, you have to come to

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Speaker 1: some kind of a solution that limits the spending program

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Speaker 1: going forward, or ties taxes to better control of spending. Something.

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Speaker 1: I think you know that because you were a leader,

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Speaker 1: and now I think the pay go system that puts

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Speaker 1: some discipline back in the thing, that's shorter thing we

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Speaker 1: need going forward. In my opinion, I was very proud

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Speaker 1: of the fact that a speaker, I launched the effort

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Speaker 1: that led to the only four consecutive balanced budgets in

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Speaker 1: your lifetime. And actually when I left office, Alan greenspan

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Speaker 1: is sharing the FED. You may remember I actually had

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Speaker 1: a working group trying to figure out if we paid

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Speaker 1: off the federal debt, how would they manage the money supply.

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Speaker 1: That seems so weird today. I have to tell you this.

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Speaker 1: I remember that I was on the FMC at the

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Speaker 1: time and I kind of chuckled because I said, you know,

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Speaker 1: this is wonderful that we have this situation, but it's

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Speaker 1: not going to last. It didn't. No, it didn't. But

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Speaker 1: you know, the only time I think we've ever fully

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Speaker 1: paid off the national debt was Andrew Jackson, and there

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Speaker 1: was a brief parade, there was no money, and he

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Speaker 1: actually took the surplus and gave it out to the

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Speaker 1: undebted states. But that also created a certain level of instability.

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Speaker 1: It's a very complex story. One of the things I

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Speaker 1: think people don't fully yet is you know the death

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Speaker 1: ceiling was raised seven times under Obama, was raised seven

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Speaker 1: times under George W. Bush. The process of raising it,

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Speaker 1: as I understand it, historically, prior to about nineteen seventeen,

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Speaker 1: Congress would literally have to authorize each bond issue, and

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Speaker 1: they decided that was too big a pain, so they

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Speaker 1: went to a death seal and control model, which we've

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Speaker 1: now had with us for over one hundred years. I

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Speaker 1: think one of the things people get confused by is,

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Speaker 1: let's say that Secretary Yelling is right. She said, Basically,

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Speaker 1: they technically crossed the line last week. But they can

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Speaker 1: manage the cash flow, and they can manage the way

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Speaker 1: in which bills come due, probably up through sometime in June,

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Speaker 1: without technically having a problem. What would the real world

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Speaker 1: consequences be if the United States was unable to find

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Speaker 1: a solution, Well, I think it'd be pretty dramatic because

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Speaker 1: number one, people don't understand, so that means it's clear

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Speaker 1: in people's minds that the government would not pay interest

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Speaker 1: on its debt held globally, not only domestically, so that

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Speaker 1: would bring uncertainty forward. Also, you have to borrow to

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Speaker 1: pay your millions of government employees, So that would be

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Speaker 1: a question mark, and I think all that uncertainty would

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Speaker 1: undermine the economy. If we are in danger of a recession,

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Speaker 1: that might actually make it deeper. So I think there

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Speaker 1: aren't serious consequences from failing to increase if the US

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Speaker 1: actually technically defaulted, that it was unable to pay the

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Speaker 1: bonds as they rolled over, which is something you've seen

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Speaker 1: Argentine to do several times in other countries. But given

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Speaker 1: the size of our economy and the role of the

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Speaker 1: dollar worldwide, how big a shock to the world fiscal

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Speaker 1: system would an American default be. It's hard to say,

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Speaker 1: I guess, but in the sense it would be significant

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Speaker 1: because it is the global reserve currency, and that currency is,

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Speaker 1: shall we say, supported by the fact that everyone knows

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Speaker 1: it is a reliable debt out there and the US

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Speaker 1: can in fact fund it even if it has to

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Speaker 1: borrow more. And if you take that away, people say,

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Speaker 1: well what do I do next? And uncertaintly undermines economic

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Speaker 1: systems in the US. But because we are the reserve currency,

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Speaker 1: I think more broadly, so I think it is a

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Speaker 1: serious issue, and I don't think waiting until you have

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Speaker 1: up against a debt ceiling is any way to manage

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Speaker 1: the responsibility of an international reserve currency. So the Congress,

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Speaker 1: both parties have to come and say, we can't go

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Speaker 1: on like this. We've got to get this thing worked out.

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Speaker 1: And I do think it's a little bit like calling wolf. Now,

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Speaker 1: we've done it so many times, like you said, seven

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Speaker 1: times under Obama, seven times under Bush. I've seen standoffs before.

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Speaker 1: We've had temporary shutdowns, and then you open it up

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Speaker 1: again and people say, well, it'll be okay. So what

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Speaker 1: everyone expects is that there'll be a lot of yelling

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Speaker 1: and streaming over the next six months, and that there

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Speaker 1: will be some kind of a compromise that will come

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Speaker 1: forward and that we will go forward. That's there's sumpsh

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Speaker 1: people are operating on although they're not quite sure, and

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Speaker 1: the less sure they become that then the more I

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Speaker 1: think risk there is to the domestic economy and to

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Speaker 1: the global economy. Just to make it clear for our listeners,

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Speaker 1: isn't it true that being the world's reserve currency is

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Speaker 1: an enormous economic advantage of United States? Absolutely? When the

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Speaker 1: pound was the world reserve currency, it gave Britain enormous

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Speaker 1: leverage and now we've had for over a half century

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Speaker 1: all the advantages of being the safest place in the world,

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Speaker 1: which is why my daughter, who lives in Key, Biscaine,

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Speaker 1: sees an amazing number of Latin Americans who it's a

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Speaker 1: flight to safety. I mean, they trust the United States

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Speaker 1: when they don't trust necessarily their local government. And so

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Speaker 1: it pours capital into the US in a way that

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Speaker 1: I think we don't fully appreciate. So in a sense,

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Speaker 1: if we could work backward, we have to find a

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Speaker 1: way to solve this, and not solving it is not

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Speaker 1: an option. It's not an option, and for us in

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Speaker 1: the long run, it's absolutely critical because you can print money,

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Speaker 1: and that's basically what we're doing here. You can print

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Speaker 1: money until you've actually debatched your currency, and then what

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Speaker 1: do you do. It's not something that happens tomorrow. It

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Speaker 1: takes decades perhaps, but just think about it. I mean,

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Speaker 1: we've increased our debt and therefore the amount of money

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Speaker 1: from ten trillion to thirty one trillion dollars in a

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Speaker 1: little more than a decade. If we continue at that rate,

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Speaker 1: you are inviting inflation, you are inviting loss of confidence

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Speaker 1: in your currency. Now, our advantage also is the rest

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Speaker 1: of the world is managing as poorly as we are,

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Speaker 1: and therefore it still makes us kind of what I

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Speaker 1: call grading on the curve, still keeps us a preferred currency,

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Speaker 1: but you can't assume that in reportuity and be a

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Speaker 1: world class economy. I think there is a point where

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Speaker 1: in the dollar worldwide, literally in twenty one hundred dollar

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Speaker 1: bill units, is a sort of an invisible currency and

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Speaker 1: virtually every country in the world. But that's because they

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Speaker 1: actually think it'll be worth a dollar. And yet when

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Speaker 1: you start getting seven eight nine percent inflation, you literally

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Speaker 1: are basically cheating the people who are holding the money.

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Speaker 1: Not only that, when you get percent inflation, you're cheating

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Speaker 1: the world that holds it. You're cheating your own citizens

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Speaker 1: who hold and you're taxing your citizens. So it's a

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Speaker 1: very irresponsible path to be on, I think. And you

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Speaker 1: know the other community is it picks up its own momentum.

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Speaker 1: We are index two thirds of our government to inflation,

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Speaker 1: so that means debt has to go up. How are

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Speaker 1: you going to fund it? Secondly, the interest on the

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Speaker 1: debt has to go up, and as interest rates are rising,

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Speaker 1: it's going to go up extremely rapidly, So that's going

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Speaker 1: to cause greater pressures going forward. And where's this money

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Speaker 1: going to come from? More printy, and that's where you

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Speaker 1: get yourself in this vicious cycle. And I think you

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Speaker 1: decrease the value of your currency over time to a

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Speaker 1: point where it becomes less of a sought aft international currency.

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Speaker 1: Now again, takes time, but we're working on it. Well. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean, Congressional Budget Office has been warning since I

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Speaker 1: think twenty fourteen that the current spending cycles unsustainable and

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Speaker 1: we'll cripple the economy and lower the standards of living.

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Speaker 1: They're absolutely right. I mean, we're increasing our carried so

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Speaker 1: rapidly that we will in fact slow Here's one of

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Speaker 1: my concerns. The feeder reserve has to walk away from

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Speaker 1: this themselves. They have to provide some discipline. They have

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Speaker 1: been monetizing this debt for some time now. That's allowed

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Speaker 1: the government to fund this at very low rates. That

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Speaker 1: cannot continue. People have to realize this coming out of

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Speaker 1: their pocket so that we don't just spend openly and freely.

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Speaker 1: We know there has to be consequences to it, and

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Speaker 1: we've got to learn that sooner or rather than later.

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Speaker 1: What my point was going to be when you realize it,

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Speaker 1: and then not too distant future. At the way we're

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Speaker 1: going paying interest on the debt will be larger than

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Speaker 1: the defense budget. Absolutely, So we'll be taxing our children

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Speaker 1: and grandchildren not to pay off the debt, but just

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Speaker 1: to pay interest every year. Think about it. You have

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Speaker 1: to pay let's just say roughly four hundred billion dollars.

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Speaker 1: Soon our injuries on the day will be over eight

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Speaker 1: hundred billion dollars. And if we keep accumulating, and it

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Speaker 1: looks like we will trillion dollars of new deficits every year,

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Speaker 1: we're going to be paying on interest a trillion dollars

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Speaker 1: and it will exceed the defense budget and other discretionary items.

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Speaker 1: The big part of that will be then entitlement program

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Speaker 1: will balloon. We are on a very dangerous path, in

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Speaker 1: my opinion. Part of the fight that she is going

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Speaker 1: to be between those who are willing to raise the

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Speaker 1: debt ceiling if there are reforms on spending, and those

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Speaker 1: who are demanding that the deat sailing be raised with

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Speaker 1: no reforms. I have a hunch that the next month

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Speaker 1: or two that's going to be the central debate. I think.

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Speaker 1: So it's going to be fingerpointing for the next month

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Speaker 1: or two. You have to raise it. And the truth

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Speaker 1: is they are going to have to raise the ceiling

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Speaker 1: because the money is committed. I mean, the debates that

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Speaker 1: took place in December over increasing both defense and non

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Speaker 1: defense discriptionary items was the debate that's said, are we

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Speaker 1: going to spend ever more money? Understandably important debate and

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Speaker 1: the agreement was yes, we are. So now we know

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Speaker 1: that that and they knew that that would be exceeded,

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Speaker 1: that ceiling would be exceeded, and now we're in that situation.

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Speaker 1: So you've agreed to spend it, you're spending it, and

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Speaker 1: now you have to fund it. And the discussion and

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Speaker 1: I think it is, okay, how do we re establish

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Speaker 1: some kind of discipline around future spending that obviates the

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Speaker 1: need to have these frequent debt ceiling increases? And some

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Speaker 1: people say, well, just remove it, and that is an option,

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Speaker 1: but at the same time, I'm not sure that would

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Speaker 1: provide any additional discipline to the spending side, So that

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Speaker 1: has to be thought through. President Biden has a non

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Speaker 1: negotiation kind of an initial stance, but since he actually

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Speaker 1: negotiated in twenty eleven on the death ceiling. I'm not

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Speaker 1: so sure that this isn't sort of the opening round

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Speaker 1: rather than the final argument, because I don't think he

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Speaker 1: can get it out of the house without very substantial changes. Well,

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Speaker 1: I certainly hope it's the first, shall we say, salvo

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Speaker 1: over the field, and I hope both sides are saying,

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Speaker 1: we're going to see how we get to a compromise.

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Speaker 1: But both sides realize that they have to get to

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Speaker 1: a compromise the past not being able to do that

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Speaker 1: because the debt's going to only increase. It's indexed, it's

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Speaker 1: going to increase. So how do you not only raise it,

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Speaker 1: but how do you get a mechanism to keep it

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Speaker 1: from going without some kind of paygo, some kind of

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Speaker 1: discipline around our spending. And if we want to do

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Speaker 1: tax decreases, how we do it, how we pay for

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Speaker 1: it that whichever view you have, and I think there

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Speaker 1: are important differences there. But how you're going to negotiate

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Speaker 1: through that, I think has to be figured out now.

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Speaker 1: And this saying well, we're not going to talk to you,

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Speaker 1: this is it. It won't work, and the American people

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Speaker 1: will suffer, and so will every international position. I wonder

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Speaker 1: if this is a pretty good time to start raising

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Speaker 1: the point of we ought to get on a track

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Speaker 1: that would move us towards a balanced budget and start

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Speaker 1: thinking through what the reforms would have to be in

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Speaker 1: order to have a government we could actually afford. Does

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Speaker 1: that seem too pie in the sky to I hope not,

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Speaker 1: because it's essential. I mean, it's absolutely essential we begin

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Speaker 1: to do that again. Let me just tell you that

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Speaker 1: brought some meaningful discipline agreed upon and helped us address

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Speaker 1: the deficits, and we came towards a balanced budget. If

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Speaker 1: you think of the pandemic bail shall we say, crisis management.

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Speaker 1: In terms of the spending, there were transfer payments not

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Speaker 1: just to those who were unemployed, but the people who

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Speaker 1: were well employed that we're receiving monthly checks. Our excess savings,

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Speaker 1: that is, savings above the long term average increased over

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Speaker 1: two and a half trillion dollars. So what we did

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Speaker 1: is we said, well, this money is free, we want

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Speaker 1: to make sure we stimulate the economy. We'll put all

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Speaker 1: this money out even to people who are working. So

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Speaker 1: there was the absence of discipline made the ability to

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Speaker 1: spend I think irresponsibly more easy, and you have to

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Speaker 1: take that out of it. You have to take that

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Speaker 1: out first, and then you have to bring greater stability

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Speaker 1: into how we spend our money. It's not free. It

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Speaker 1: takes resources, it transfers resources. It does disincent people from

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Speaker 1: doing tasks they might do had they not had the

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Speaker 1: transfer payment brought to them. This is the time to

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Speaker 1: seriously think responsibly about how we put more people back

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Speaker 1: into the labor market, how we discipline our spending, how

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Speaker 1: we pay for our spending. These are things that I

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Speaker 1: think have fallen by the wayside and need to be

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Speaker 1: brought back sooner rather than later, or I think we

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Speaker 1: undermine this wonderful economy in the long term. And the

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Speaker 1: America's New Majority Project that we've been working where we've

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Speaker 1: done a lot of focus groups, a lot of Paul's

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Speaker 1: about seventy six percent support for having a work requirement

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Speaker 1: if you get money. We found when we did that

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Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety six on welfare, people just streamed into

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Speaker 1: the private sector market and got off of welfare because

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Speaker 1: if they're actually going to have to do something for it,

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Speaker 1: that I might as well go get a job. And

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Speaker 1: I think there are fourteen or sixteen states now where

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Speaker 1: the amount they subsidize is so great that you lose

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Speaker 1: money if you go to work, which is crazy. I'm

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Speaker 1: aware of those studies, and I think it is crazy.

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Speaker 1: I think it undermines your ability to produce. As a nation.

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Speaker 1: We have ten million jobs and six million job seekers.

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Speaker 1: I don't think we've been out to balance that bad

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Speaker 1: in my memory, that's for sure. So why don't we

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Speaker 1: think about that in terms of the supply of labor

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Speaker 1: and what's keeping that supply from increasing. Is it really

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Speaker 1: that we don't have laborers, or is it that we

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Speaker 1: have incentives that keep labor on the sidelines at least

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Speaker 1: it deserves. There's a lot of attention buying the Congress

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Speaker 1: of the United States. They've been five members already who

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Speaker 1: have proposed balanced budget amendments. Representing Scott Perry, I think

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Speaker 1: is a very interesting one which he called proposing a

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Speaker 1: balanced budget Amendment to the Constitution, requiring that each agency

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Speaker 1: and department's funding is justified, and he goes through how

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Speaker 1: he would require us to get to a balanced budget

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Speaker 1: and what we do. Brian Fitzpatrick from Pennsylvania also introduced

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Speaker 1: a resolution called proposing an Amendment to the Constitution United

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Speaker 1: States to provide for balanced budgets. Representative Derek Van Orden

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Speaker 1: from Wisconsin introduced a similar resolution, and Representative Jay Obernotte

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Speaker 1: from California introduced a resolution. Representing Zach Nunn from Iowa

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Speaker 1: introduced a resolution. So you're beginning to see across the

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Speaker 1: whole country. Members step forward and say, you know, let's

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Speaker 1: have a debate about whether or not we're going to

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Speaker 1: reform the government and get back to actually paying our

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Speaker 1: own way rather borrowing from our children and grandchildren. And

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Speaker 1: I think this may become one of the biggest issues

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Speaker 1: in this Congress by the time the debate really gets ruling.

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Speaker 1: They need to be introduced, and they need to be discussed,

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Speaker 1: and they need to be debated. And even if you

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Speaker 1: don't get balanced budget amendment, you get the discussion out

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Speaker 1: there and perhaps you get legislation that again, like your

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Speaker 1: period says wait a minute, we've got to get this

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Speaker 1: plan together and we've got to bring our budget back

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Speaker 1: into balance. You know, there are always exceptions, But here's

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Speaker 1: the difficulty. I understand the exceptions. I mean wartime, yes,

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Speaker 1: the pandemic for part of it, but it becomes a

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Speaker 1: what I call the entry point into forever subsidies from

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Speaker 1: the government, forever payments, transfer payments that you can't back

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Speaker 1: out of because there's no rule that says, wait a minute,

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Speaker 1: you've got to balance the budget within certain time period,

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Speaker 1: or if you're going to increase the spending, you've got

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Speaker 1: to cut back here. You've got to bring those rules back,

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Speaker 1: or I think we are going to be having these

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Speaker 1: standoffs again in two or three years when the next

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Speaker 1: ceiling is broken, and it will be unless you have

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Speaker 1: some kind of bind around the spending and taxing of

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Speaker 1: the United States. Within the United States, when we sent

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Speaker 1: out to balance the budget, we deliberately sidestep Social Security

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Speaker 1: because we knew how the left would use it and

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Speaker 1: we knew we couldn't sustain it. Margaret Thatcher and all

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Speaker 1: the privatizations she did, never touched the National Health Service

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Speaker 1: for the same reason. There are certain things you can't do.

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Speaker 1: But we were able to reform Medicare in a presidential

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Speaker 1: election year with AARPS support, And part of the reason

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Speaker 1: was we convinced everybody how serious we were, and everybody said,

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Speaker 1: you know, if everybody's going to give a little, I

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Speaker 1: guess I've got to get so you create a totally

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Speaker 1: different psychological environment for this kind of conversation. Absolutely, you

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Speaker 1: have to have shared sacrifice. I call it. You know

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Speaker 1: it's important, like you say, for your children and grandchildren.

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Speaker 1: You know you have to do these things. So let's

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Speaker 1: get started doing it and do it in a way

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Speaker 1: that we all have confidence we're sharing in this adjustment.

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Speaker 1: And you get that by talking to one another and

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Speaker 1: knowing that is in the Congress. Instead of saying your

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Speaker 1: bad we know we have this issue. We've got to

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Speaker 1: find a way to do exactly what you're saying and

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Speaker 1: sounds naive. Without that, I don't know how you're going

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Speaker 1: to get there. It's like any family. I mean, you've

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Speaker 1: got the family has to be engaged. The family has

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Speaker 1: to feel like, hey, this is important to all of us,

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Speaker 1: and I'm going to do my share exactly right. Otherwise

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Speaker 1: it doesn't work. Otherwise it doesn't work and falls apartment.

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Speaker 1: I want to thank you for joining me. I think, well, here,

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Speaker 1: how hopefully our listeners have gained a better understanding both

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Speaker 1: of the national debt, the gradual problem we're sliding into

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Speaker 1: the debt ceiling, and the conversation we all need to

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Speaker 1: have to use the debt ceiling as an opportunity to

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Speaker 1: start turning the corner on runaway spending. It's always great

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Speaker 1: to have you. You're so knowledgeable and have such a

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Speaker 1: solid background. I want to thank you again for joining

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Speaker 1: me on news world and sharing with us. Thank you

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Speaker 1: for having me, good to be with you. Thank you

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Speaker 1: to my guests Thomas Hunting. You can learn more about

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Speaker 1: the death sailing debate on our show page at newtsworld

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Speaker 1: dot com. Newts World is produced by gingwishtree sixty and iHeartMedia.

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Speaker 1: Our executive producer is Garnsey Sloan, our producer is Rebecca Howe,

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Speaker 1: and our researcher is Rachel Peterson. The our work for

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Speaker 1: the show was created by Steve Penley. Special thanks to

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Speaker 1: the team at Gingwish three sixty. If you've been enjoying Newtsworld,

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Speaker 1: I hope you'll go to Apple Podcast and both rate

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Speaker 1: us with five stars and give us a review so

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Speaker 1: others can learn what it's all about. Right now, listeners

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Speaker 1: of Newtsworld can sign up from my three free weekly

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Speaker 1: columns at gingwistre sixty dot com slash newsletter. I'm Newt Gingrich.

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Speaker 1: This is Newtsworld