Speaker 1: I'm Alec Baldwin. And here's the thing. With political discourse
Speaker 1: on television, dominated by bombast fact twisting and outrageous personal attacks,
Speaker 1: it's easy to dismiss every bit of it as a
Speaker 1: worthless side show. But one of the rare voices worth
Speaker 1: listening to is George Will. He won a Pulitzer in
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy seven for his political commentary, much of which
Speaker 1: was critical of President Nixon. He has a column in
Speaker 1: both The Washington Post and Newsweek, and he's been a
Speaker 1: regular panelist on ABC's This Week on Sunday mornings since
Speaker 1: ninety one. While politically conservative, he's not afraid to direct
Speaker 1: his criticism to the right and extend dinner invitations to
Speaker 1: the left. George Will's passion for all things political started early, well,
Speaker 1: at the first election I remember was Dewey Truman and
Speaker 1: forty eight. I was, I guess seven years old, and
Speaker 1: I remembered how and why. Well, I just remember the
Speaker 1: static on radio, the stuff about it going on, and
Speaker 1: a chair you pull up with the adult exactly. In
Speaker 1: nineteen fifty two, I remember Taft his running and for
Speaker 1: the Republican nomination against Eisenhower, speaking in Champagne Illinois, and
Speaker 1: I went to see that. I remember ST's Key Farber,
Speaker 1: Tennessee senator who is running for first and fifty two
Speaker 1: and again in fifty six. Uh in fifty six when
Speaker 1: he became Stevenson's running made at the convention when Stevenson,
Speaker 1: through the convention opened to pick the vice president. So
Speaker 1: I saw a few of these national candidates and got interested.
Speaker 1: His career in political journalism started forty years ago when
Speaker 1: he was hired to be editor of the National Review.
Speaker 1: Over the years, he's established himself as a consistent and
Speaker 1: respected voice in American political life. George Wills also a
Speaker 1: baseball writer and a passionate fan. I can't remember life
Speaker 1: without it. And growing up in central Illinois on the
Speaker 1: Illinois Central Railroad, the main line of Mid America as
Speaker 1: it was called, taking trains to Chicago, sort of fixated
Speaker 1: on Chicago. And this was pre television, so baseball was
Speaker 1: literally in the air. There were two teams in Chicago
Speaker 1: and two in St. Louis. The St. Louis Browns were there. St.
Speaker 1: Louis was the westernmost outpost of baseball, and I just
Speaker 1: got hooked on the radio, the voice of it all.
Speaker 1: It was my connection to Metropolitan America if you will sports,
Speaker 1: and particularly about baseball, then because it's a rich sediment
Speaker 1: of numbers, it was one of the first things a
Speaker 1: young person could peg up with adults on that you
Speaker 1: could know as much about Jimmy Fox as your father did.
Speaker 1: Will's book meant at work. The Craft of Baseball was
Speaker 1: a New York Times best seller. But back to politics,
Speaker 1: namely the presidential election, about which Will has no shortage
Speaker 1: of opinions. He considers the number of debates during the
Speaker 1: recent Republican primary season excessive. When I spoke with him
Speaker 1: earlier this year, he told me the primaries were just
Speaker 1: a mess, and he says the current race is far
Speaker 1: from over. I certainly do not think this is a
Speaker 1: slam dunk for either side. Give you a little background
Speaker 1: into Republicans in the Senate or the White House of
Speaker 1: White House, let's start with it. In two thousand and eight,
Speaker 1: Barack Obama had all the wind at his back, everything
Speaker 1: going from it was an African American at a time
Speaker 1: when the country was eager to do that. The Republicans had,
Speaker 1: in the view of many of us, pretty much disgraced
Speaker 1: themselves at home and abroad. Free years they nominated in
Speaker 1: the implausible seventy two year old Warrior and a really
Speaker 1: implausible running mate. The country was in economic meltdown. Just
Speaker 1: everything was going wrong. Obama had been two years out
Speaker 1: of the Illinois State legislature. He was a raw shock
Speaker 1: test for the nation. You could project whatever you wanted
Speaker 1: on him as a fairly unknown candidate to get be
Speaker 1: all things to all people. Still, he got fifty two
Speaker 1: point eight percent of the vote. Question. Democratic Party is
Speaker 1: the oldest political party in the world. How many Democratic
Speaker 1: candidates in the history of that party have got more
Speaker 1: than fifty three of the vote and is only three
Speaker 1: Andrew Jackson for Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson. The Republicans, a
Speaker 1: younger party, have had ten candidates good over which means
Speaker 1: that in two thousand and twelve Obama is probably going
Speaker 1: to get less than fifty two point eight percent of
Speaker 1: the vote. Why do you think the Democrats have a
Speaker 1: harder time getting about I don't know. I have an opinion. Well,
Speaker 1: because they're they're typically very often when they're at their best,
Speaker 1: and both sides I want to focus on them at
Speaker 1: their best. The Democrats are asking people to vote against
Speaker 1: their own interests very often where the Republicans are asking
Speaker 1: people to vote for their interests for it, which is
Speaker 1: an easier row stone to push up there slightly tendentious presentation.
Speaker 1: When was the last time the Democrats asked the United
Speaker 1: Auto Workers to vote against their interest When the last
Speaker 1: time they asked the teachers unions to vote against their interests?
Speaker 1: I should think it's exactly the reverse. The Democratic problem
Speaker 1: in addressing the country is that it is so much
Speaker 1: a mosaic of vested interests that the Democratic Party has become,
Speaker 1: in my judgment, a had done of reactionary liberalism. Whatever
Speaker 1: is should always be only bigger. Well, when I look
Speaker 1: at the you know what are considered liberal policies, democratic policies,
Speaker 1: progressive policies, I think to myself, well, at least there
Speaker 1: was an effort by them, albeit sometimes an ill conceived one,
Speaker 1: to solve a real problem. Do you think that these
Speaker 1: people are not really trying to solve a problem that
Speaker 1: they try to the Democrats, Sometimes they're trying to solve problems.
Speaker 1: Sometimes the problem they're trying to solve is the unsliked
Speaker 1: appetite of an interest group. Right, you think Obama has
Speaker 1: a chance to win, Sure, you do, Yeah, what do
Speaker 1: you think Roby's biggest problem is people don't warm to him.
Speaker 1: They don't dislike you, but they don't like him. That's
Speaker 1: different and in some ways more deadly, because if people
Speaker 1: don't like you, it's because you've said something or stand
Speaker 1: for something, and you can always persuade them or change
Speaker 1: into something else. Right, if they just don't cotton to you,
Speaker 1: it's it's hard to think about you at all. Well,
Speaker 1: it's hard to repeal chemistry. It And what do you
Speaker 1: think is going to be Obama's biggest battle in the election.
Speaker 1: I think the sense that he's Jimmy Carter, amiable, decent,
Speaker 1: well meaning, and out of his depth. You know, there's
Speaker 1: an old saying in Washington at least, that overnights a
Speaker 1: long time, and a week is forever in American politics.
Speaker 1: We haven't heard the last from Spain. We haven't heard
Speaker 1: the last from various economic difficulties. If the economy stalls,
Speaker 1: which it easily could do, who knows. You mentioned earlier
Speaker 1: about the mess of the Republican primary season and what happened,
Speaker 1: and I was joking with some friends how I thought that,
Speaker 1: to some extent, the only thing Obama needs to do
Speaker 1: when he runs against Romney, has show clips of all
Speaker 1: the things that gang Ridge said about Romney during the
Speaker 1: primary period, and he might be halfway there. Well, except
Speaker 1: being criticized by new gang Ridge is not necessarily a problem.
Speaker 1: But in my lifetime, this was really the realm of
Speaker 1: the Democrats, the circular firing squad, and the Republicans in
Speaker 1: my left and were never like that, I mean the
Speaker 1: Republican they fell in line and supported the nominee. What
Speaker 1: happened do you think this time around? Well, first of all,
Speaker 1: the varsity didn't show up. The best players didn't the
Speaker 1: Mitch Daniels and others, Jeb Bush, and so you had
Speaker 1: people who are trying to establish a kind of status
Speaker 1: and purchase on the electorate that that didn't bring to
Speaker 1: the party to become stars. If you become stars, and
Speaker 1: we had this lunatic proliferation of debates. When a baseball team,
Speaker 1: thirty baseball teams go to spring training, they know everyone
Speaker 1: I'm gonna win sixty games, everyone I'm gonna lose sixty games.
Speaker 1: You play the whole damn season to sort out forty
Speaker 1: two games. It's a little bit that way in politics.
Speaker 1: The Republicans are going to vote Republican, particularly in this
Speaker 1: polarized climate. The Democrats are going to vote democratic. We're
Speaker 1: really going to be fighting this fall, all this money
Speaker 1: and time and energy over twelve percent of the electorate.
Speaker 1: I think I watched you on Colbert and you said
Speaker 1: that parties were you quoted whoever it was you quoted,
Speaker 1: where parties were systems by which we organize our hates
Speaker 1: and our Henry Adams and that. But do you think
Speaker 1: most people that's that's true? Do you think, for example,
Speaker 1: I vote the way I vote because I'm voting against
Speaker 1: someone as opposed to force someone else. You're voting against
Speaker 1: someone else, but not hatred. The American people are really
Speaker 1: not haters. We're big boys and girls. We've been doing
Speaker 1: this a long time. We're the most experienced democracy. We
Speaker 1: understand that people have different political sensibilities. Those people cluster,
Speaker 1: we call the clusters parties. We fight it out a
Speaker 1: big deal. But when you say that people, it is
Speaker 1: not a hatred involved. Would you agree that in your lifetime,
Speaker 1: in your career, you've seen that it's reached a kind
Speaker 1: of an ugly time now in terms of media, meaning,
Speaker 1: especially in the conservative media, where it was liberal too
Speaker 1: because I mean, obviously Olberman, and there's a whole MSNBC
Speaker 1: crab which seems to have been wanting to mimic their
Speaker 1: counter parts over at Fox. But do you see that
Speaker 1: the rhetoric has changed over the last several years and
Speaker 1: somewhat although I mean it used to be Republicans against Republicans.
Speaker 1: My first vote for president was in the Goldwater election.
Speaker 1: I was a cheerful Goldwater right. In fact, I will
Speaker 1: it a visit a button. You're gonna give me no, no,
Speaker 1: But our Kennedy listeners can't see this. But anyway, I've
Speaker 1: got a Goldwater button is the wallpaper on my cell phone,
Speaker 1: and some of us never forget. But again, a little perspective.
Speaker 1: In the seventeen nineties, in the Great Election of eighteen hundred,
Speaker 1: the Adams sites said if Jefferson's elected, they will confiscate
Speaker 1: the Bibles and women will not be safe on the streets.
Speaker 1: The Jeffersonian said, if Adams is elected, we will have
Speaker 1: a monarchy installed in this country and will be subservient
Speaker 1: to France. In the eighteen fifties, Preston Brooks of South
Speaker 1: Carolina Congressman goes on the Senate floor accompanied by an
Speaker 1: aide holding a gun to hold off the other senators
Speaker 1: on the Senate floor, used his cane to beat Senator
Speaker 1: Charles Sumner mass Usetts so severely he was out of
Speaker 1: the Senate for three years. People of South Carolina were
Speaker 1: so approving of this they inundated his office with new canes.
Speaker 1: We've been through really violent times and we're in one
Speaker 1: of those periods now and it will burn over. But
Speaker 1: in your profession, in the political professional class, the punditocracy,
Speaker 1: whatever you want to call it, now we have a
Speaker 1: whole network which is very, very tilted in one direction.
Speaker 1: Did you see them coming to have two whole networks? Well, look,
Speaker 1: thirty years ago CNN was found in an eighty one,
Speaker 1: I think thirty years ago at the dinner hour in
Speaker 1: this country, of all television sets in used were turned
Speaker 1: to Cronkite Chancellor and Peter Jennings. Today we have this
Speaker 1: cornucopia of news sources. People to find journalism on their
Speaker 1: own terms, get it on their own time. I was
Speaker 1: told by an activist in South Carolina during the primary
Speaker 1: this year that a survey showed that seventy two of
Speaker 1: all Republican primary voters in South Carolina get all, not
Speaker 1: most all of their news from Fox News. On a
Speaker 1: Republican candidate buys an ad on Fox News, he's not broadcasting,
Speaker 1: he's narrowcasting right into Republican voters now. In a way,
Speaker 1: this too is a reversion when the party system developed
Speaker 1: in the seventeen nineties and early eighteen hundreds, American newspapers
Speaker 1: were largely factional papers. Some of them were paid by
Speaker 1: the parties. So we may look back upon the Some
Speaker 1: would say the pretense of objective journalism or nonpartisan journalism
Speaker 1: as an episode of parenthesis in our nationals last incarnation
Speaker 1: and something. Have you ever been approached by some of
Speaker 1: those folks. I would imagine that they would have been
Speaker 1: dying Fox and Ales for you to come work. Did
Speaker 1: you know? I? I know and like your l's and
Speaker 1: Brett Human and these people of friends of mine. No,
Speaker 1: I've been with this one show on ABC for thirty
Speaker 1: one years and there was never an attempt by anyone
Speaker 1: to try to poach Shoot to enhance their credentials to
Speaker 1: have a truly sober voice among that crowd. They've got
Speaker 1: sober boys. Look Brett Bears six o'clock news program on
Speaker 1: foxes as good as it gets. What do you think
Speaker 1: about those labels? If you had to, how do you
Speaker 1: prefer to be labeled on the conservative? Conservative? Sure? To
Speaker 1: you that's defined by what today limited government government, the
Speaker 1: Madisonian project that we shall have a government of dual sovereignty,
Speaker 1: national and state, and that the national government shall be
Speaker 1: as he said in Federalists forty five, the Proposed Constitution.
Speaker 1: Because we're the Federalist papers were newspaper columns advocating ratification
Speaker 1: of the constitution. The powers granted to the federal government
Speaker 1: by the proposed Constitution are few and definite. This is
Speaker 1: the argument in the sp in court over the healthcare plan.
Speaker 1: That is, if the commerce clause is so elastic that
Speaker 1: it can accommodate the action of mandating the purchase of healthcare,
Speaker 1: then we really do not have any longer the Madisonian
Speaker 1: vision of a government of limited, delegating and enumerated powers.
Speaker 1: But do you think that the way that those powers
Speaker 1: have shifted, and you do think that the way that
Speaker 1: the government has in its role in our society has
Speaker 1: evolved over the last two hundred something years, do you
Speaker 1: think that some of that has to do with the
Speaker 1: fact that it was in a grarian society that was
Speaker 1: fueled to a large degree by slave labor over two
Speaker 1: h years ago. Obviously a change in the role of
Speaker 1: the central government was inevitable. But you can accommodate a
Speaker 1: lot of changes in the central government without undoing the
Speaker 1: principle of limited government and enumerated powers. If you could
Speaker 1: pick three things that are policy issues right now that
Speaker 1: you really think need to be changed, but that's what's
Speaker 1: best for the country, what do you think that they
Speaker 1: would be? What areas would they? First of all, I'd
Speaker 1: strike down the mandate and with it the entire healthcare
Speaker 1: plan is. I think it doubles down on all it's
Speaker 1: wrong with the health care system. Second, I would deregulate
Speaker 1: American politics. McCain find gold on all the rest have
Speaker 1: made a perfect message. Why do you think they've set
Speaker 1: out to do something flagrantly unconstitutional, which is ration the quantity,
Speaker 1: limit the content, and dictate the quantity of timing of
Speaker 1: political Citizens United. You approved of that, of course, Oh absolutely.
Speaker 1: The funny thing about Citizens United is some of the
Speaker 1: people who most spociferously dislike it are so enraged they
Speaker 1: haven't had time to read it. New York Times editorially said.
Speaker 1: What Sheldon Nadolson, the Las Vegas casino mogul, has been
Speaker 1: doing and contributing money fifteen at least fifteen million dollars
Speaker 1: to the superpack supporting New Gangbridge, is an example of
Speaker 1: what Citizens United has done to our politics. What Sheldon
Speaker 1: Nadolson is doing has nothing to do with Citizens United.
Speaker 1: What he's been doing has been done in America since
Speaker 1: George Washington to day and has been a constitutional right
Speaker 1: since Buckley B. Vallet in n s. But what do
Speaker 1: you think campaign finance reformed regulation was an attempt to
Speaker 1: address Do you think that we just was just drawing
Speaker 1: at a thin air? Do you think that there was
Speaker 1: a real problem? To shock you by telling you where
Speaker 1: I think it really began where it wasn't Watergate wasn't.
Speaker 1: It was nineteen sixty eight, Geene McCarthy set out to
Speaker 1: challenge Lyndon Johnson. You know how I did it. He
Speaker 1: couldn't do it today because it's illegal. He got about
Speaker 1: eleven wealthy liberals to give him what in those days,
Speaker 1: with serious money, hundred thousand dollars a piece or something,
Speaker 1: And with this large liberal money, he mounted a campaign.
Speaker 1: Democrats were so horrified by this disruption of their party's
Speaker 1: presidential selection that they began because of Jeane McCarthy, an
Speaker 1: attempt to make it more difficult for that to happen. Uh,
Speaker 1: I think you can put the entire necessary and constitutional
Speaker 1: regulation of campaign financing seven words, no cash, full disclosure,
Speaker 1: no foreign So transparency is something that you're not opposed,
Speaker 1: not opposed to. What do you think about do you
Speaker 1: think about public financing? I can just gas, but go
Speaker 1: ahead and let's I'm just teeing up the ball for
Speaker 1: food stamps for politicians. I don't. It is the most
Speaker 1: regularly and accurately polled issue in our country because every
Speaker 1: April fifteenth, when people complete their tax returns, Americans vote
Speaker 1: on this the little box they can shoot and they
Speaker 1: can give three bucks. I think it now is to
Speaker 1: fund politics. It doesn't increase their tax liability at all.
Speaker 1: And percentday American people refuse to do well. It's this
Speaker 1: is the one act of tax defiance that they can exhibit.
Speaker 1: It props when they're filling especially when they're filling out
Speaker 1: that form at that time of year. Anyway, it's not
Speaker 1: gonna happen. You know, this is an issue. I've spent
Speaker 1: a lot of time working on and you know, to me,
Speaker 1: the problem that exists that led to the recent culture
Speaker 1: of campaign finances is we just have lousy people running
Speaker 1: for office. A lot of people don't want to because
Speaker 1: they don't want to raise money. It's gone from one
Speaker 1: full day now. My friends told me that anance. It's
Speaker 1: too they spend forty of the work week raising money.
Speaker 1: I'll solve that problem in ten minutes. Repeal the limits
Speaker 1: on giving. They're raising money and these little dribs and drabs,
Speaker 1: and you don't think there's a quid pro quo attached
Speaker 1: to that fundraising. I do not think that corruption, of
Speaker 1: the appearance thereof it should be addressed that way. Let
Speaker 1: them take a hundred thousand dollars from anyone. Let them
Speaker 1: take a hundred thousand dollars from Philip Morris, put it
Speaker 1: on the internet at the close of business every day.
Speaker 1: Let the journalists wallow around and not let the country
Speaker 1: make up its mind the problems you're seeing. The transparency
Speaker 1: is more the issue that transparency is at most the issue.
Speaker 1: What I'm saying is this, the lion's share of political
Speaker 1: money goes to disseminate political speech. Therefore, as justice William
Speaker 1: doug said, a liberal icon on the Supreme Court to
Speaker 1: regulate political spending is to regulate the quantity of political speech.
Speaker 1: We're constantly hearing from the political reformers there's too much
Speaker 1: money in politics. There's no other way to translate that,
Speaker 1: and saying there's too much political speech. I disagree. Money
Speaker 1: is not all powerful. You know who the great money
Speaker 1: raisers have been on politics in the last fifty years.
Speaker 1: The really exciting one's George Wallace and Bury gold Water,
Speaker 1: and they did it with small contributions. This country is
Speaker 1: a washing money, they said earlier this year. It turns
Speaker 1: out probably not true, but they said, you know, Barack
Speaker 1: Obama and the Republicans might each raise a billion dollars
Speaker 1: this year. Gosh, every year in March and April, the
Speaker 1: American people spend two billion dollars on Easter candy. The
Speaker 1: country's swimming in money. That's not a lot of money,
Speaker 1: but at least with the money that's spent in easter candy,
Speaker 1: they're getting their money's worth. In my judgment, the most
Speaker 1: remarkable fact is how little money we spend on politics,
Speaker 1: considering the stakes, the trillions of dollars influenced by political decisions.
Speaker 1: We spend remarkably including money that spent on lobby. Now
Speaker 1: that's different. I'm talking about the political the electoral politics. No,
Speaker 1: we spend much more money on lobby and sensibly so
Speaker 1: why sensibly so? Well as you know it's a lobbying
Speaker 1: as one of the few professions I'm on one journalism, Uh,
Speaker 1: clergy is a second, and lobbying is the third profession
Speaker 1: protected by the First Amendment. It's called petitioning for redress
Speaker 1: of grievance. It's a pressuring the government. It's a good
Speaker 1: thing to do. You said that earlier that the people
Speaker 1: who showed up this year we're not the stars in
Speaker 1: the Republican primary period. And you mentioned Mitch Daniels was
Speaker 1: one who you were. Were you hopeful Daniels was going
Speaker 1: to give an amazing just in terms of pure interest,
Speaker 1: not in terms of your own favoring him as a candidate.
Speaker 1: I was four him. It was your candidate at a
Speaker 1: bottle eleven o'clock at night on Saturday May one, ste
Speaker 1: a call. I got a call at home from him.
Speaker 1: Both Mary and my wife and I are old friends
Speaker 1: of his, and he says, I'm not going to go
Speaker 1: at that point, I decided I didn't have a dog
Speaker 1: in this fight. And what about Jeb Bush, Well, you know,
Speaker 1: if his name were Jeb Smith would be a different matter.
Speaker 1: And once you've had Bush Clinton, you believe in you,
Speaker 1: you believe he'd be a worthy candidate. Why based on what,
Speaker 1: first of all, his tremendous accomplishments was, particularly regard to
Speaker 1: primary and secondary education in the state of Florida. Is
Speaker 1: it just a grown up, sober, happy, cheerful politician. How
Speaker 1: do you look back on his on his brother's presidency,
Speaker 1: now the eight years he was in office, Well, I'm
Speaker 1: not a compassionate conservative. Uh. Do you think he was
Speaker 1: for limited government? No, certainly not. That's well he said
Speaker 1: at one point, when somebody hurts, government has to act. No,
Speaker 1: not really, certainly not the federal government. Uh. The grafting
Speaker 1: on a new entitlement on the Medicare, the prescription drug entitlement,
Speaker 1: the first entitlement we've ever had with no dedicated funding.
Speaker 1: Just threw it out there as I will pay for
Speaker 1: it somehow. He campaigned in two thousand promising a more
Speaker 1: humble foreign policy that didn't work out so well. When
Speaker 1: you say I mean I had a friend of mine
Speaker 1: once explained to me in so many words, and this
Speaker 1: is many years ago, so I might not get this
Speaker 1: prepared him. But he articulated a kind of a libertarian
Speaker 1: view which I think sounds similar to yours. And his
Speaker 1: take was that the mantra of the Republican Party was
Speaker 1: I'm a winner and I just don't want you to
Speaker 1: ruin my party. You know what I mean. I want
Speaker 1: to be able to put my feet up at the
Speaker 1: end of the after eighteen holes at the clubhouse, and
Speaker 1: I want to enjoy myself. Do you believe that in
Speaker 1: our society that people the federal government is an attempt
Speaker 1: to address to give something to the losers, if you
Speaker 1: will to placate then to the welfare state ALEC is
Speaker 1: a huge regressive transfer of wealth from the working, young
Speaker 1: and middle aged to the retired elderly in the form
Speaker 1: of pensions and medical care. And because the elderly, after
Speaker 1: a lifetime of accumulation, are the wealthiest cohort in the country,
Speaker 1: the welfare state is a regressive transfer of wealthy idea
Speaker 1: that the welfare state exists primarily to help the poor
Speaker 1: is refuted by a cursory reading of the federal budget.
Speaker 1: I believe the transfer goes to the elderly. Sure transfer
Speaker 1: goes to the organized, most muscular interests. Big government is
Speaker 1: big because it has big ambitions. It knows how wealth
Speaker 1: an opportunity ought to be allocated. Big government is therefore
Speaker 1: inevitably responsive to big, powerful interest groups. I subscribe to
Speaker 1: what the poet Robert Frost said. He said, I do
Speaker 1: not want to live in a homogenized society. I want
Speaker 1: the cream to rise. Certainly, you do not want an
Speaker 1: egalitarian society dictated the regardless of your ability to add value,
Speaker 1: everybody gets a trophy. Yeah, it's it's like soccer for
Speaker 1: eight year olds. You showed up, given a trophy. Is
Speaker 1: there anything about the health care bill that you like,
Speaker 1: or the or the or the spirit of it that
Speaker 1: you like? Nothing about? But I'm sure in two thousand,
Speaker 1: seven hundred pages it would be the law of averages.
Speaker 1: He had to get something right. What do you think
Speaker 1: is the proper way to address the healthcare crisis? How
Speaker 1: would you recommend we would solve that problem of health
Speaker 1: insurance for Americans. It's an amazing thing to me, is
Speaker 1: that John McCain got it right in two thousand and eight.
Speaker 1: I say, that's amazing because John is not interested in
Speaker 1: domestic policy. If it doesn't fly or explode, I don't care.
Speaker 1: But John McCain said, look, tax all employer provided health
Speaker 1: insurance is what it obviously is compensation. But give people
Speaker 1: a large tax credit to go into a national market.
Speaker 1: I'll come to that for that in a minute, and
Speaker 1: shop for healthcare among competing approved plans. That is basically
Speaker 1: what all federal employees have, including Barack Obama. That's how
Speaker 1: that's how we do with federal employees. National market is crucial.
Speaker 1: You know, turn on your television. You're going to see
Speaker 1: State Farm auto insurance competing with Progressive Auto insurance, competing
Speaker 1: with All State auto insurance, competing with Geico Auto insurance.
Speaker 1: I could see that with healthcare insurance. Why because we
Speaker 1: are not allowed to buy health care insurance across state lines,
Speaker 1: which is so dumb even a caveman can understand. Because
Speaker 1: the state legislatures like to keep this captive industry so
Speaker 1: that when the acupuncture lobby comes to Springfield, Illinois and says,
Speaker 1: we will show our gratitude to you if you will
Speaker 1: just put make it mandatory that acupuncture has to be
Speaker 1: covered in our in the state point of that insurance.
Speaker 1: Not sure, So the plans get more and more comprehensive
Speaker 1: and lavish, and people are forced to buy things they
Speaker 1: don't want to buy. Acupunct your coverage, therapeutic nail trimming,
Speaker 1: and up up, up, up goes the cost of health insurance. Uh,
Speaker 1: let's have a market and competition. So they wanted to
Speaker 1: have like each state wants to be a closed shop
Speaker 1: that each state is. Even though you said you're not
Speaker 1: a compassionate conservative, what's something you think Obama could do?
Speaker 1: You think he has it in him to do, You
Speaker 1: might even be doubtful about it. But what's something you
Speaker 1: think you hope Obama will do in the second term
Speaker 1: if he gets selected, he may come to his senses
Speaker 1: in your in your ideology about well, this is not
Speaker 1: coming to his senses, but something he's uniquely qualified to do.
Speaker 1: He's an African American, he's an exemplary husband and father
Speaker 1: and family man. The immeasurably biggest tragedy in American life
Speaker 1: today is that seventy four percent of African American children
Speaker 1: are born to mothers with that husband's We know the
Speaker 1: whole range of social pathologies that accompany this particularly a large,
Speaker 1: constantly renewed cohort of unparented adolescent males, meaning chaotic neighborhood
Speaker 1: schools that can't teach all the rest. I would like
Speaker 1: to see Barack Obama address that his community, that he kiss,
Speaker 1: community that he could I mean, it's not his. His
Speaker 1: community is the American community, his roots in the inter city.
Speaker 1: I mean, because he is one of the most the
Speaker 1: greatest things about American life today inve is the the
Speaker 1: picture of the Obama family. Is that something that's especially
Speaker 1: deeply held to you about family and about Pat Morenahan
Speaker 1: was at the time of his death, probably my best friend.
Speaker 1: Pat in nineteen sixty five brought down upon his head
Speaker 1: a reign of acid abuse and accusations of racism because
Speaker 1: he then he was an assistant Secretary of Labor in
Speaker 1: the Johnson administration, published a book on the crisis and
Speaker 1: the Negro family said, there is today a crisis in
Speaker 1: the Negro family because the out of wedlock birth rate
Speaker 1: is I think it was twenty four seventy four to day.
Speaker 1: For American society as a whole, it's thirty three sixty
Speaker 1: of children of all races and ethnicities born to women
Speaker 1: under twenty five born to single women. Family disintegration is
Speaker 1: at the heart of most of our problems. You think
Speaker 1: that's a result of what feminism? No one knows. No
Speaker 1: one knows what it is because it's happened in Wales,
Speaker 1: It's happened all over the world. No one knows what
Speaker 1: it is everywhere with its contraception. Now, it's not just
Speaker 1: it's not No one knows and anyone who thinks they
Speaker 1: do and hasn't looked at the problem. Right. And I
Speaker 1: live in a time, and I've lived in a time
Speaker 1: where I never dreamed Obama would beat Hillary Clinton. Never
Speaker 1: and and and it's interesting in those comments you made
Speaker 1: on the television show I watched, where you said that
Speaker 1: the Clinton have lost a lot of their their lure
Speaker 1: and everything. At that time, I just couldn't conceive that
Speaker 1: Hillary would lose the nomination. I really really thought she
Speaker 1: was going to win. And I think I told George
Speaker 1: Stephanopolis in March two thousand seven, March two thousand seven,
Speaker 1: I said Barack Obama will be nominated and elected. I
Speaker 1: just could not see the country saying we're nostalgic for
Speaker 1: the Clinton years, which they weren't, right, They weren't. Well,
Speaker 1: what do you think her political future is? Zero? Zero?
Speaker 1: There's a whole generation of coming candidate Andrew Andrew Cromo
Speaker 1: and New York Governor Malley and Maryland countless people and
Speaker 1: Paul Ryan, all kinds of good people out their governors.
Speaker 1: The rest. What do you think, gangwige Is future is books?
Speaker 1: And yeah, it's it's a books and talking on TV
Speaker 1: and commentating, talking. He does lots of that. You you
Speaker 1: mentioned in one conversation you had that you thought that
Speaker 1: Bill Buckley was the most consequential journalist of the twentieth century.
Speaker 1: Did you have a personal relationship with him? Yes, it
Speaker 1: was a fresh it's a good Well how did you
Speaker 1: meet him? When I was a college professor at the
Speaker 1: University of Toronto, I wrote a few things for National Review,
Speaker 1: and then I went to work in Washington for a
Speaker 1: senator from Colorado, Gordon Ella. Seventy through seventy three. You
Speaker 1: moved to Washington, win to work on the Senate staff
Speaker 1: from the University of Toronto. As seventy two, donned. I
Speaker 1: decided three years was enough. I wanted to go into journalism.
Speaker 1: So I picked up the phone and I called Bill,
Speaker 1: and I said you need a Washington editor of National Review,
Speaker 1: and Bill said, essentially, your right eye do and you're in.
Speaker 1: He hired people like that, Gary Wills, John Didion, people
Speaker 1: like that and me and others who just struck his
Speaker 1: fancy and he hired them. He was good at that.
Speaker 1: I started work for National Review the week Sirika's sentence
Speaker 1: caused James McCord to crack and the Watergate thing began
Speaker 1: to unraveled. So here I was the Washington at a
Speaker 1: or of the flagship conservative publication, and I was quite
Speaker 1: convinced that Nixon was guilty and it was going to
Speaker 1: have to go, and it was really hard on National Review.
Speaker 1: Bill was a wonderful and didn't I'll agree that Nixon
Speaker 1: had to go. We'll tell you tell your story. No, no, no.
Speaker 1: Bill's brother, Senator Buckley, as he then was Jim Buckley,
Speaker 1: was the first to call for Nixon to resign, first
Speaker 1: of the Republican Senate contingent. But we were meeting down
Speaker 1: in the National Review offices on thirty Street, and Bill
Speaker 1: was at one end of the table and I was
Speaker 1: at the other. Nie said, George, UM, what's going to happen?
Speaker 1: And I said, Nixon's guilty in the system works, and
Speaker 1: Bill flashed that electric Jack Nicholson smile and said, I
Speaker 1: think he's guilty in the system doesn't work. Why why, Well,
Speaker 1: he just meant that he'd get away with it. But
Speaker 1: Carl Bernstein said in a in a thing we were
Speaker 1: talking about. I did a program with him, and Carl
Speaker 1: said that border Gate was the last time quote unquote
Speaker 1: the system worked in this country because both sides of
Speaker 1: the aisle work together to try to restore the dignity
Speaker 1: of the presidency. And it was Republicans and Democrats who
Speaker 1: both were seeking the truth and scissor result of that
Speaker 1: thought that Nixon had to go. I think the system
Speaker 1: works more often then people think it doesn't work in
Speaker 1: a tidy and pretty way. But no one ever said
Speaker 1: democracy is Do you think it worked during irround contract? Yeah? Matter,
Speaker 1: Well they stopped it, it was revealed, it was investigated,
Speaker 1: God knows, it was investigated to death by congressional committees,
Speaker 1: by independent on the people. Both both sides. I don't
Speaker 1: want to accuse one side of the other other of this.
Speaker 1: Do you think that both sides because I look at
Speaker 1: the whole world. I've grown up as a pre worter
Speaker 1: Gate post Wartergate world, and you would not want to
Speaker 1: know how Franklin Roosevelt used the FBI and how Franklin
Speaker 1: Roosevelt used the I R S to punish enemies and
Speaker 1: people like that. I'm sure that they did. They don't
Speaker 1: do it anymore. I mean the system is much more
Speaker 1: policed and self policing. I believe it's true. So buck
Speaker 1: so Bucklets of the system didn't work. Now, Buckley was
Speaker 1: the I cost National Review a lot of trouble because
Speaker 1: National Review then as now relied as small magazines generally
Speaker 1: do new on contributions to keep it going, and National
Speaker 1: Review would analyze its male and the memo had a
Speaker 1: category called subscription cancelations. And George will because they were
Speaker 1: the same thing, I was making people mad. Bill never once,
Speaker 1: not once, tried to restrain what I said about Next year.
Speaker 1: He was a wonderful guy and tremendously fair. You look
Speaker 1: back on Nixon, now, what do you think of him?
Speaker 1: The forty years? Next year he resigned? Next year? Ye,
Speaker 1: we're getting old. You can say the Nixon was You
Speaker 1: don't want someone in politics who didn't enjoy it. He
Speaker 1: was so miscast for a profession that is ninety percent
Speaker 1: making small talk with strangers. They have to kind of
Speaker 1: like it. And Nixon was an unhappy man in the profession.
Speaker 1: You want happy people in politics. When did the television thing?
Speaker 1: From from Buckley? When did the television thing begin? Almost immediately?
Speaker 1: I started with National Review and seventy three, and I
Speaker 1: started a syndicated column in seventy four, and I started
Speaker 1: doing television on a regular basis. Did that happen? Who
Speaker 1: approached her? The Post Newsweek stations? They own five owned
Speaker 1: and operated stations at that time. I post that kather
Speaker 1: and Graham. Do you think that you're being so even
Speaker 1: handed with Nixon? Is what had Katherine Graham want to
Speaker 1: hire you for a televisionsion. No, I'll tell you exactly
Speaker 1: what happened. I left the Senate staff to become a
Speaker 1: writer at the end of seventy two, and Agnew was
Speaker 1: crashing around the country maw mowing the press about being
Speaker 1: too liberal, and the press was responding by desperately seeking
Speaker 1: conservative columnists. And Bill Sapphire left the White House, and Sapphire,
Speaker 1: Will and Pat Buchanan, another White House guy, all started
Speaker 1: columns at the same time The Post, Washington Post in
Speaker 1: the New York Times competed for Sapphire the post lost
Speaker 1: and settled for me. That's how that's exactly when you
Speaker 1: started with them. Then still enjoy TV. Yeah, it's as
Speaker 1: you know, television is survival of the briefest. And it's uh,
Speaker 1: it's inherently unsatisfying. I mean, like writing better, oh much more. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's wonderful pleasure, tactile pleasure putting together a nice paragraph.
Speaker 1: So do you have I mean, when I think you'll
Speaker 1: help clear up this image, I have an image of
Speaker 1: an office of yours with a gigantic corkboard and there's
Speaker 1: about two d and fifty post it's on it with
Speaker 1: different ideas. I mean, you must have it. Just a limitless,
Speaker 1: bottomless ideas for columns you want to write. Actually, I
Speaker 1: have in my pocket. This is not suitable for radio,
Speaker 1: but I have always a list in my wallet with
Speaker 1: the next columns I want to write. Have about a
Speaker 1: dozen pots that are on the stove. Now. When I
Speaker 1: started writing, I asked Bill Buckley the question that I
Speaker 1: now know is that most commonly asked question of a columnist,
Speaker 1: which is how do you come up with ideas of
Speaker 1: things to write about? Bill said, the world irritates me
Speaker 1: three times a week. I would say, we say the
Speaker 1: world irritates or amuses or piques my curiosity. Do you
Speaker 1: read in the paper? Man? In print? Radio, listen to
Speaker 1: and watch on TV? I don't listen to radio. Why
Speaker 1: because when I'm in my car, I'm listening to books,
Speaker 1: audio books always. I listen to audio books. I've got
Speaker 1: my little smartphone here. I have twenty books on here.
Speaker 1: I'm listening to right now. A biography was coming up
Speaker 1: to the studio. I was listening to a biography of
Speaker 1: President Monroe. Television. I watch, you know, if it didn't
Speaker 1: on ESPN, I'm to miss it. I go in the morning,
Speaker 1: turn onto Major League Baseball Network at seven thirty, and
Speaker 1: turn it off when I leave. Um. I read my
Speaker 1: good friend Charles Kraudhammer. Bob Samuelson writes about economics for
Speaker 1: the Post, every Post, Wall Street Journal, New York Times,
Speaker 1: all the newspapers. Yeah, in print. Not God. Now me
Speaker 1: to my friends, I want to tear it up and
Speaker 1: file it. When you're not working. What do you do
Speaker 1: go to baseball games? You're a national san I'm a
Speaker 1: cub fan. Cut your cup fan? Yeah, proximity year there
Speaker 1: at the Nationals and I have a handicap son works
Speaker 1: in the clubhouse of the Nationals. How old is your son? Forty?
Speaker 1: You have how many children? And you have been married
Speaker 1: twice twice? And you're how many kids with your first
Speaker 1: wife three? And you have one child with your second one? Yep,
Speaker 1: he's a sophomore in dying to ask George Will this question,
Speaker 1: what's your advice to me on my second marriage? Well,
Speaker 1: you know it's the definition of second marriage is the
Speaker 1: triumph of hope over experience. As I say to people,
Speaker 1: even people from the Deep South, visit Grants tumb every
Speaker 1: now and then. You know, we gotta put the past
Speaker 1: behind us. Love is more wonderful the second time around.
Speaker 1: All the Great American Songbook, The Great American Songbook contains
Speaker 1: all of philosophy anyone needs. Yeah, maybe you're right, George Will.
Speaker 1: The Washington Journalism Review named him best writer any subject.
Speaker 1: After talking with Will, one question stayed in my mind. Hello, Hello, Yes,
Speaker 1: so I called him up. So my question for you
Speaker 1: is your political philosophy if you will makes me think
Speaker 1: that you believe that people will do the right thing
Speaker 1: if left alone, without government interference, without government regulation, that
Speaker 1: you trust that people will do the right thing if
Speaker 1: left to their own devices. Do you still feel that way?
Speaker 1: Not exactly? Universal free public education, the requirement to send
Speaker 1: children to schools of some sort indicates a powerful belief
Speaker 1: entertained by the Enlightenment founders of our country that people
Speaker 1: need to be schooled in the virtues necessary for a
Speaker 1: free society. Far sightedness, discipline, all of that. So the
Speaker 1: more freedom you have, the more care you need to
Speaker 1: take in nurturing people suitable for it. I do believe
Speaker 1: that the American people have fairly sturdy virtues, and that
Speaker 1: left to their own devices, which is to say, left
Speaker 1: to make voluntary arrangements and transactions with other free people,
Speaker 1: will more often than not a do the right thing
Speaker 1: or be do better than any alternative arrangement for advancing society.
Speaker 1: I lost the bet. What what was the bet? My
Speaker 1: bet was I would ask you, if left to their
Speaker 1: own devices, would people do the right thing? And you
Speaker 1: would simply say yes and hang up the phone. No,
Speaker 1: not that temple. This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening
Speaker 1: to here's the thing before un