WEBVTT - Bernie Sanders Thinks Democrats Are Still Way Off-Course 0:00:02.800 --> 0:00:06.080 This is Alec Baldwin, and you're listening to here's the thing. 0:00:07.520 --> 0:00:11.280 In his first political race for US Senate in nineteen 0:00:11.400 --> 0:00:16.440 seventy two, a horn rimmed, disheveled young socialist named Bernie 0:00:16.480 --> 0:00:20.640 Sanders lost badly, getting only two percent of the vote. 0:00:21.760 --> 0:00:25.520 In one he had his first electoral victory by just 0:00:25.720 --> 0:00:30.400 barely becoming mayor of Burlington, Vermont, by ten votes. By 0:00:30.440 --> 0:00:34.120 two thousand six, he was a popular congressman and easily 0:00:34.159 --> 0:00:37.800 won the national Senate seat he had chased decades before. 0:00:38.960 --> 0:00:42.280 And while he lost the Democratic Party nomination last year, 0:00:42.320 --> 0:00:46.400 Bernie Sanders has become someone with real influence in the party. 0:00:46.920 --> 0:00:50.960 His new book, Bernie Sanders Guide to Political Revolution, gives 0:00:51.040 --> 0:00:54.800 others the tools to make change as well. In her 0:00:55.120 --> 0:00:59.040 new book, Hillary Clinton wrote that Sanders quote didn't get 0:00:59.080 --> 0:01:01.640 into the race to make sure a Democrat won the 0:01:01.640 --> 0:01:05.160 White House. He got in to disrupt the Democratic Party. 0:01:06.319 --> 0:01:10.080 It's an assessment Bernie Sanders agrees with. I thought that 0:01:10.120 --> 0:01:13.480 it was absolutely imperative that the country needed to hear 0:01:13.520 --> 0:01:17.840 from somebody who was more progressive than Hillary Clinton. Uh. 0:01:17.880 --> 0:01:23.320 There are ideas that absolutely needed to get out there. Uh, 0:01:23.360 --> 0:01:25.200 and that would not have gotten out there if a 0:01:25.280 --> 0:01:28.959 progressive was not in the race. But I guess on 0:01:29.040 --> 0:01:31.480 a more personal level, do you stare down at this 0:01:32.400 --> 0:01:34.760 black diamond ski run and say, I'm do I have 0:01:34.760 --> 0:01:37.160 the emergy? Well? What fears did you have? You see, 0:01:37.200 --> 0:01:40.360 we started in a different position. We started I think 0:01:40.360 --> 0:01:42.559 the first polls had us at three or four or five. 0:01:43.880 --> 0:01:46.160 So it wasn't like we were in this race and 0:01:46.280 --> 0:01:48.560 you know, we're forty percent and we were close to 0:01:48.640 --> 0:01:52.520 winning it. So for us, what the campaign was about 0:01:53.280 --> 0:01:57.040 was the first of all, formulate the positions that we 0:01:57.080 --> 0:02:00.840 believed in strongly. And many of those positions, by the way, 0:02:01.520 --> 0:02:04.280 today are more or less mainstream, but they weren't when 0:02:04.280 --> 0:02:07.320 we began a campaign for fifteen dollar and now, in 0:02:07.400 --> 0:02:11.240 minimum age, a trillion dollars to rebuild a crumbling infrastructure. 0:02:11.560 --> 0:02:13.920 I'm just a few years ago I proposed a trillion. 0:02:13.960 --> 0:02:16.280 People said, oh my god, that's much too much. Four 0:02:16.360 --> 0:02:19.120 hundred billion is about all that we could afoid. Now 0:02:19.160 --> 0:02:22.800 even Trump talks about a trillion dollars to rebuild our infrastructure, 0:02:23.080 --> 0:02:25.359 and you do, no fears, no doubts. I mean, I'm 0:02:25.360 --> 0:02:27.840 sure you must have had I believe what I believe 0:02:28.840 --> 0:02:30.800 and I believe the country has got to move in 0:02:30.800 --> 0:02:34.080 a much more progressive agenda. I think we have to 0:02:34.120 --> 0:02:37.120 deal with the horrific levels of income and wealth inequality. 0:02:37.160 --> 0:02:39.160 We have to deal with the corrupt political system in 0:02:39.160 --> 0:02:43.720 which billionaires are able to buy elections. We have to 0:02:43.760 --> 0:02:47.680 address the issue of climate change and transformer energy system. 0:02:47.960 --> 0:02:49.560 These are issues that I've been talking about for a 0:02:49.680 --> 0:02:52.079 very very long time. These are issues that I think 0:02:52.080 --> 0:02:55.040 the majority of the American people believe in. And what 0:02:55.160 --> 0:02:57.480 motivated me was simply to go out and say, look, 0:02:57.520 --> 0:03:01.240 this is the reality facing America. We can't continue to 0:03:01.280 --> 0:03:04.280 have a situation with so few have so much and 0:03:04.360 --> 0:03:07.920 so many have so little. We can't continue a political 0:03:07.960 --> 0:03:10.320 system where the Cooch brothers alone are able to spend 0:03:10.400 --> 0:03:12.640 hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars to by elections. 0:03:12.720 --> 0:03:15.720 That's not what this country it's supposed to be about. Well, 0:03:15.720 --> 0:03:19.119 those were my ideas, but what was interesting is how 0:03:19.200 --> 0:03:23.160 quickly it became apparent that millions and millions of people 0:03:23.280 --> 0:03:27.000 shared those ideas, that people wanted to think outside of 0:03:27.040 --> 0:03:29.760 the box, that they were prepared to look at more 0:03:29.800 --> 0:03:33.360 progressive solutions than what Democrats and Republicans have been bringing 0:03:33.400 --> 0:03:38.600 food and um, do you ever ask yourself if Hillary 0:03:38.720 --> 0:03:42.360 is likely the winner, do you think she's probably gonna win? So? 0:03:42.360 --> 0:03:46.840 How do I influence her to express the opinions I want? 0:03:47.080 --> 0:03:49.320 I don't need to run if I can get her 0:03:49.360 --> 0:03:52.119 to do some But the only way, the only way 0:03:52.200 --> 0:03:57.240 you can do that is when people themselves respond to 0:03:57.400 --> 0:04:03.200 specific ideas. All right, What we found during the campaign, 0:04:03.240 --> 0:04:06.800 for example, just one example, is that the idea that 0:04:06.840 --> 0:04:09.680 the United States of America remains the only major country 0:04:09.680 --> 0:04:12.240 on Earth not to guarantee healthcare to all people. Okay, 0:04:12.360 --> 0:04:15.120 I livety miles away from Canada, they do it. As 0:04:15.160 --> 0:04:18.719 you know, throughout Europe, healthcare is a right. And on 0:04:18.800 --> 0:04:21.280 top of that, in this country we end up spending 0:04:21.320 --> 0:04:24.400 almost twice as much per capital. It's not like we're 0:04:24.400 --> 0:04:27.920 saving money. We're spending a fortune on healthcare per person. 0:04:28.320 --> 0:04:30.400 We pay by far the highest prices of the world 0:04:30.400 --> 0:04:34.920 for prescription drugs. Question, why aren't we doing what every 0:04:34.920 --> 0:04:36.600 other major country on Earth is noting? What do you 0:04:36.600 --> 0:04:38.719 think we're not? Well, Obviously it has to do with 0:04:38.760 --> 0:04:41.080 the power of the insurance companies and the drug companies 0:04:41.279 --> 0:04:44.800 and the whole medical industrial complex. They are enormously powerful. 0:04:45.520 --> 0:04:49.480 Then the doctors themselves. Doctors are powerful too, but the 0:04:49.520 --> 0:04:52.039 insurance companies and the drug companies have far more powerful. 0:04:52.480 --> 0:04:54.640 And what you find is that the drug companies have 0:04:54.760 --> 0:04:59.920 spent hundreds of billions of dollars in lobbying in can 0:05:00.080 --> 0:05:03.560 paying contributions to make certain that there is no law 0:05:03.720 --> 0:05:07.000 on the books to prevent the drug company for doubling 0:05:07.080 --> 0:05:09.720 or tripling the price that you pay for medicine today. 0:05:09.880 --> 0:05:11.720 And the result of that is we pay far more 0:05:11.760 --> 0:05:14.000 than the people of any other country. So when you 0:05:14.080 --> 0:05:16.599 raise these issues during your campaign, you know what people 0:05:16.640 --> 0:05:19.600 saw nodding their heads and they say, yeah, that's ridiculous, 0:05:19.640 --> 0:05:21.919 that's absurd. We should not be paying the highest prices 0:05:21.920 --> 0:05:24.039 of the world. Drug companies have got to be regulated 0:05:24.200 --> 0:05:26.760 in one form or another. So the drug companies are saying, 0:05:26.880 --> 0:05:30.279 no government regulation of the pricing of our of our products. 0:05:30.400 --> 0:05:32.120 We were we were afraid that that would be and 0:05:32.279 --> 0:05:35.880 likely would be a component of a universal healthcare Canadian 0:05:35.920 --> 0:05:38.599 style health care. Here. What about the insurance companies they want? 0:05:39.680 --> 0:05:41.920 If what is the function of an insurance company, it's 0:05:41.920 --> 0:05:44.400 not to provide quality care across the effect the ways 0:05:44.480 --> 0:05:47.320 to make as much money, as course they possibly can. 0:05:48.080 --> 0:05:51.400 And UM, you know what I think makes sense to 0:05:51.520 --> 0:05:56.159 me is we have right now a fairly popular, successful 0:05:56.200 --> 0:05:59.159 program called Medicare. It works pretty well for people sixty 0:05:59.240 --> 0:06:01.960 five years of age rol why not expand it to everybody? 0:06:02.240 --> 0:06:05.320 To Medicare will become a universal health exactly now, UM, 0:06:06.360 --> 0:06:10.800 aside from the cries of the insurance and pharmaceutical industries, 0:06:11.480 --> 0:06:14.520 what are things that that actually happened that transpired as 0:06:14.560 --> 0:06:18.840 a result of universal healthcare and Canada that the medical 0:06:18.960 --> 0:06:22.680 profession warned about here, meaning, what's something you see happening 0:06:23.400 --> 0:06:27.520 they that that didn't go well. No system on earth 0:06:27.640 --> 0:06:29.840 is a perfect and the Canadians will be the first 0:06:29.920 --> 0:06:32.680 to tell you their system is not perfect. But pole 0:06:32.880 --> 0:06:36.480 after poll shows that there is enormous pride in Canada 0:06:36.560 --> 0:06:39.119 with their system. Of course, very few of those people 0:06:39.320 --> 0:06:41.640 and Canadians want to come to the American system. They 0:06:41.680 --> 0:06:48.440 have problems for non emergency type services for certain types 0:06:48.520 --> 0:06:52.000 of surgeries, knee replacements and so forth. They're waiting time 0:06:52.040 --> 0:06:54.599 so longer than they are comfortable with. On the other hand, 0:06:54.839 --> 0:06:56.880 if you need to see a doctor, you can get 0:06:56.920 --> 0:06:59.520 to a doctor pretty quickly. And sometimes when we talk 0:06:59.560 --> 0:07:02.120 about the Nadian system. We forget, you know, let me 0:07:02.160 --> 0:07:04.640 tell you something. If you think that most Americans haven 0:07:04.720 --> 0:07:06.800 call the doctor's office today and walk in in a 0:07:06.880 --> 0:07:09.200 few hours, you are mistaken. There are waiting lines in 0:07:09.240 --> 0:07:12.040 this country as well. So the good news is we 0:07:12.160 --> 0:07:14.120 can learn a lot from the Canadians. We can learn 0:07:14.120 --> 0:07:17.520 a lot from other countries around the world, all of 0:07:17.600 --> 0:07:21.320 them who have been doing universal healthcare for many decades. 0:07:22.440 --> 0:07:24.600 I want to ask you about growing up. You grew 0:07:24.680 --> 0:07:27.720 up in Brooklyn and your father what did he do 0:07:27.800 --> 0:07:29.320 for a living? He was a pain salesman, he was. 0:07:30.560 --> 0:07:32.840 Do you have any siblings. Ye? I got an older 0:07:32.880 --> 0:07:35.920 brother who lives in Oxford, England. And what did he do? 0:07:36.520 --> 0:07:38.680 It's fair living. He was a social worker in England. 0:07:38.800 --> 0:07:41.000 He was a social work in England and he left 0:07:41.080 --> 0:07:43.160 to move to England many years ago. He's been over 0:07:43.160 --> 0:07:44.920 there for many, many years ago. And just the two 0:07:44.960 --> 0:07:47.360 of you, Yes, And what did your mom do? She 0:07:47.640 --> 0:07:51.600 was she was housewife. Right. Who do you think had 0:07:51.680 --> 0:07:54.280 a greater influence on you or do they have an 0:07:54.320 --> 0:07:56.560 equivalent to influence on you in terms of your politics? 0:07:56.600 --> 0:07:58.880 Of your parents or your grandparents for that matter. Well, 0:07:59.520 --> 0:08:02.920 Mike Paul politics. I think developed from the fact that 0:08:03.120 --> 0:08:06.400 we lived in a rent control department in Brooklyn. It's 0:08:06.440 --> 0:08:09.680 a small, three and a half room apartment. My father 0:08:09.800 --> 0:08:12.160 worked very hard, and he had a steady job his 0:08:12.360 --> 0:08:15.720 entire life. He worked for one company, Keystone Paint and 0:08:15.800 --> 0:08:18.200 Varnish Company. But you haven't made a lot of money. 0:08:19.000 --> 0:08:22.280 And so the fact that we did not have the 0:08:22.320 --> 0:08:24.440 money to do the things that my mother wanted us 0:08:24.480 --> 0:08:28.000 to do, rather modest things, impacted my life. It's a 0:08:28.080 --> 0:08:30.240 modest thing your mother wanted you to do. While she 0:08:30.320 --> 0:08:34.280 always wanted to own her own home, small home never happened. 0:08:35.080 --> 0:08:37.760 So her dream was someday she would own her own home, 0:08:37.960 --> 0:08:40.280 and she didn't. So we lived in a rent control 0:08:40.360 --> 0:08:44.240 department for our entire lives. Is growing up and when 0:08:44.320 --> 0:08:46.680 she died young, and she never ended up owning her 0:08:46.720 --> 0:08:50.319 own home. Uh, you know, vacations we didn't do much of. 0:08:51.280 --> 0:08:53.120 You know, it's not that we were poor, we were 0:08:53.200 --> 0:08:56.439 lower middle class. But money was always an obstacle in 0:08:56.480 --> 0:09:00.599 a problem. And what I learned at that age was 0:09:00.800 --> 0:09:05.040 that that problem, that reality exists for people all across 0:09:05.160 --> 0:09:09.959 this country. And the idea of trying to figure out 0:09:10.040 --> 0:09:13.040 how we can improve lives working people is something that 0:09:13.120 --> 0:09:15.480 I expect settled into my brain when I was a 0:09:16.000 --> 0:09:19.040 very young kid. So is it safe to say you 0:09:19.080 --> 0:09:22.160 don't want people to be given certain things in this world? 0:09:22.800 --> 0:09:24.520 But what you want people to not have to spend 0:09:24.679 --> 0:09:27.240 too much money on other necessities so they can have 0:09:27.360 --> 0:09:32.200 some money liberated to do other things. And I wouldn't 0:09:32.360 --> 0:09:34.079 tell me how you would phrase it. I would say, 0:09:34.200 --> 0:09:37.439 that's progressive ism to you? Is that? You know Franklin 0:09:37.480 --> 0:09:41.559 Dillon or Roosevelt, in a not widely remembered speech I 0:09:41.559 --> 0:09:43.719 think it was nineteen forty four, in his State of 0:09:43.760 --> 0:09:46.120 the Union speech a year before he died, he said, 0:09:46.160 --> 0:09:48.120 you know, in so many words on paraphrasing, you know, 0:09:48.200 --> 0:09:50.480 we have a constitution, which is great. We have a 0:09:50.520 --> 0:09:53.000 bill of rights, guarantees you the right freedom of speech, 0:09:53.400 --> 0:09:56.439 freedom of assembly, freedom of religion, etcetera. At such all 0:09:56.520 --> 0:09:59.839 those enormously important rights. Doesn't guarante you the right to 0:09:59.880 --> 0:10:04.440 help care, doesn't guarantee you the right to at least 0:10:05.880 --> 0:10:08.760 have a job that pays you a living wage. And 0:10:08.880 --> 0:10:11.280 what he was talking about was the need to broaden 0:10:11.400 --> 0:10:16.400 our understanding of what human rights are from beyond political rights. 0:10:16.480 --> 0:10:20.160 A freedom of speech, freedom of religion, to economic rights. 0:10:20.400 --> 0:10:23.720 So when I talk about the right of all people 0:10:23.840 --> 0:10:27.400 that have healthcare, I believe that is a human right. 0:10:28.200 --> 0:10:30.800 The right of people not to live in abysmal poverty, 0:10:31.000 --> 0:10:33.559 I think that's a human right when we live in 0:10:33.600 --> 0:10:36.959 the richest country in the history of the world. So 0:10:37.080 --> 0:10:40.079 the goal then is to create an economy that works 0:10:40.160 --> 0:10:43.240 for all of our people, not the kind of economy 0:10:43.320 --> 0:10:47.000 we have today that works very very successfully for the 0:10:47.080 --> 0:10:51.199 one percent and creates enormous levels of income and wealth disparity. 0:10:52.360 --> 0:10:55.199 My father, who was a political science teacher were the 0:10:55.320 --> 0:10:58.600 end of the taught American government economics in the public 0:10:58.679 --> 0:11:00.199 high school on Long Island. He would say to me 0:11:00.280 --> 0:11:03.120 that that essentially his distillation of the Reagan years was 0:11:03.200 --> 0:11:06.640 Reagan would say, you know, your taxes are so high 0:11:06.720 --> 0:11:08.280 you might not be able to have a swimming pool 0:11:08.520 --> 0:11:12.000 at your house. And if you there's things you want 0:11:12.000 --> 0:11:14.880 to buy, and it's your business what you want to buy, 0:11:14.920 --> 0:11:16.800 it's your business what you want to do with them. 0:11:17.120 --> 0:11:18.800 And so we need to cut making sure of the 0:11:18.880 --> 0:11:21.400 kids in the Inn city have clean needles and condoms. 0:11:22.480 --> 0:11:24.439 He's saying, well, this euphemistically, I mean there's things that 0:11:24.520 --> 0:11:26.400 the government is paying for that we shouldn't be paying 0:11:26.440 --> 0:11:28.679 for because that's preventing you from buying things you want 0:11:28.720 --> 0:11:30.640 to buy. And what Reagan wanted to say to people 0:11:30.720 --> 0:11:33.480 was don't feel bad about that. You want to deliberate 0:11:33.520 --> 0:11:36.240 them on on an emotional level, these people aren't gonna 0:11:36.240 --> 0:11:38.079 get taken care of and that's okay. We weren't meant 0:11:38.200 --> 0:11:40.840 to pay for that. Well that that ideology. I mean, 0:11:40.880 --> 0:11:44.880 you thought Reagan was conservative. Where the Republican Party is 0:11:44.960 --> 0:11:46.760 now the spot at the right of where Reagan was 0:11:46.840 --> 0:11:49.400 incredibly enough. And as I said before, this is what 0:11:49.480 --> 0:11:52.040 the Koch brothers believe, and this is the ideology that 0:11:52.160 --> 0:11:54.439 people like Coaul Ryan and many others now Except what 0:11:54.559 --> 0:11:59.400 they say is, look, every person is an island unto 0:11:59.760 --> 0:12:03.439 them selves, all right, And if you can go out 0:12:03.600 --> 0:12:05.000 and make a whole lot of money, you're gonna have 0:12:05.040 --> 0:12:07.120 great health care, your kid's gonna have a great opportunity 0:12:07.160 --> 0:12:09.360 to go to college. You know, live in an ice house. 0:12:10.400 --> 0:12:13.079 But if you are eighty years of age and you 0:12:13.120 --> 0:12:16.079 don't have much money, I'm sorry. It is not the 0:12:16.160 --> 0:12:18.720 obligation of the government to have a program like Medicare 0:12:19.120 --> 0:12:21.360 to take care of you if you're a worker. And 0:12:21.440 --> 0:12:22.920 this is true, this is what some of these guys 0:12:22.960 --> 0:12:26.640 actually believe. And unemployment is high in the region. And 0:12:26.840 --> 0:12:28.679 I can hire you for three bucks an hour or 0:12:28.720 --> 0:12:31.600 four bucks an hour. We don't want the government mandating 0:12:31.640 --> 0:12:35.439 a minimum wage. You're gonna work for me. That's your choice. 0:12:35.920 --> 0:12:38.240 And if you the choices between going hungary, you're working 0:12:38.240 --> 0:12:39.960 for three or four bucks. Now I offer you as 0:12:40.040 --> 0:12:41.839 a wage of what I think is profitable for my 0:12:41.960 --> 0:12:45.040 company to you take it or leave it. But you 0:12:45.080 --> 0:12:48.280 should not be guaranteed. We should the government should not 0:12:48.360 --> 0:12:51.320 be in the business of retirement security, i e. Social security. 0:12:51.679 --> 0:12:54.079 So if you look at the if you look at 0:12:54.160 --> 0:12:57.920 the Koch Brothers agenda, their go long term not tomorrow, 0:12:58.080 --> 0:13:01.400 is to abolish social security, man a cam Medicaid, federal 0:13:01.440 --> 0:13:04.720 laity to education, and you're seeing Trump moving in those directions. 0:13:04.800 --> 0:13:07.280 So you got Betsy Divoce who is now a Secretary 0:13:07.280 --> 0:13:10.199 of Education does not believe in public education. In the 0:13:10.280 --> 0:13:13.079 House right now, there is legislation that came out of 0:13:13.120 --> 0:13:16.720 the relevant Committee which would make move a social security 0:13:16.720 --> 0:13:20.760 toward a private type system. So all of that ideology 0:13:21.080 --> 0:13:25.480 is now what pervades the Republican Ombudian. That's where they 0:13:25.520 --> 0:13:28.160 want to go. Now, when you say that Divocet doesn't 0:13:28.200 --> 0:13:31.000 believe in public education, you mean she doesn't believe in 0:13:31.000 --> 0:13:32.360 it in the way you believe in it, or she 0:13:32.600 --> 0:13:35.520 literally doesn't believe in public Generally speaking, I think it's 0:13:35.559 --> 0:13:37.880 fair to say that her belief is that we should 0:13:37.960 --> 0:13:42.240 move towards abolishing public education, privatizing schooling, privatizing the school, 0:13:42.400 --> 0:13:46.679 that's the whole thing, Privatizing infrastructure, privatizing social security, privatizing 0:13:46.760 --> 0:13:51.920 the via, privatizing the prisons, privatizing the postal service. Every 0:13:52.000 --> 0:13:56.760 one of these issues is being addressed and went forward 0:13:56.800 --> 0:14:02.240 by the Republicans. Um in your progress of vision, at 0:14:02.320 --> 0:14:05.040 what point do we decide how much money people can make? 0:14:05.160 --> 0:14:07.840 Many We're going to tax people to take their money 0:14:07.920 --> 0:14:12.360 from them, to build housing for everybody, to provide medical 0:14:12.440 --> 0:14:16.319 care for everybody, to provide free education for everybody, all 0:14:16.360 --> 0:14:17.840 of which I'm in favor of. I mean, I would 0:14:17.880 --> 0:14:20.120 like to see the poor taken care of. I think 0:14:20.160 --> 0:14:23.600 we at what point do we do we worry about 0:14:23.720 --> 0:14:26.680 its impact on the overall America. First of all, I 0:14:26.720 --> 0:14:29.600 wouldn't use the word quote unquote taking care of the poor. 0:14:30.080 --> 0:14:32.440 I think what you want to do is create opportunities 0:14:32.480 --> 0:14:37.960 for low income people. It means provide excellent childcare, public education, 0:14:38.040 --> 0:14:40.880 the opportunity to go to college, job training, so that 0:14:41.000 --> 0:14:43.160 people are not poor. Now, there are some people who 0:14:43.160 --> 0:14:45.400 are not going to work, people with severe disabilities, and 0:14:45.520 --> 0:14:47.920 we have a moral responsibility to take care of them, 0:14:47.960 --> 0:14:50.440 to take care of senior citizens. But I would hope 0:14:50.480 --> 0:14:52.640 that the goal is to move towards the ending of 0:14:52.800 --> 0:14:57.360 poverty and getting lower income people into the economy so 0:14:57.480 --> 0:15:01.720 they can earn their own way. UH. I happen to 0:15:01.800 --> 0:15:06.160 believe that what we have right now UH is an 0:15:06.200 --> 0:15:10.320 obscenity in terms of distribution of wealth and income. We 0:15:10.480 --> 0:15:13.360 now have the top one tenth of one percent owning 0:15:13.840 --> 0:15:17.600 almost as much wealth as the bottom. In the last 0:15:17.680 --> 0:15:20.760 forty years, we have seen a massive transfer of wealth. 0:15:21.040 --> 0:15:24.120 I'm talking about trillions of dollars going from the pockets 0:15:24.160 --> 0:15:26.680 of the middle class into the top one percent and 0:15:26.760 --> 0:15:28.600 in the top one tenth of one percent. And I 0:15:28.720 --> 0:15:30.920 think what we have got to say is, of course 0:15:30.920 --> 0:15:32.840 they're going to be richer people, and of course they're 0:15:32.840 --> 0:15:36.600 going to be poorer people, but that level of wealth inequality, 0:15:37.320 --> 0:15:40.200 and in terms of scare us, we should scare us, 0:15:40.280 --> 0:15:42.760 should scare us. In terms of income, you know, you 0:15:42.800 --> 0:15:44.960 go around the country, You've got mom work and dad working, 0:15:45.000 --> 0:15:47.360 the kids are working. But fifty two percent of all 0:15:47.440 --> 0:15:49.560 new income in recent years is going to the top 0:15:49.640 --> 0:15:52.360 one percent. So you've got a great economy for the 0:15:52.440 --> 0:15:55.760 people on top, But the middle class for decades has 0:15:55.840 --> 0:15:59.040 been shrinking. People are working long rous for low wages. Yeah, 0:15:59.080 --> 0:16:00.880 we got to deal with that. And yes, I believe 0:16:00.960 --> 0:16:03.680 in progressive taxation. Yeah, I believe that if you're making 0:16:03.720 --> 0:16:06.120 millions of dollars a year, you're gonna have to pay 0:16:06.160 --> 0:16:09.120 a higher percentage of your income in taxes than somebody 0:16:09.200 --> 0:16:11.880 in the middle class. You know, that's what a nation 0:16:12.200 --> 0:16:13.840 is about. And one of the things that I worry 0:16:13.880 --> 0:16:17.360 about very much is the level of greed. You know 0:16:17.800 --> 0:16:21.120 that we now see you see people making billions and 0:16:21.200 --> 0:16:23.560 billions and billions of dollars, and they say that's not enough. 0:16:23.760 --> 0:16:25.760 I need more tax breaks, and I want you to 0:16:25.800 --> 0:16:28.240 cut education, and I want you to cut Medicaid, and 0:16:28.320 --> 0:16:31.240 I want you to cut programs for lower income people 0:16:31.400 --> 0:16:33.960 because I need more tax breaks. Because you know, five 0:16:34.000 --> 0:16:35.840 billion that I have is not enough. We've got to 0:16:35.880 --> 0:16:38.640 deal with that whole issue of greed. What we do 0:16:38.800 --> 0:16:41.360 want is an entrepreneurial society. We want people to be 0:16:41.400 --> 0:16:45.240 able to invest in new products, new businesses. And that's great, 0:16:45.880 --> 0:16:47.680 but at the end of the day, we cannot be 0:16:47.840 --> 0:16:50.800 a nation in which a tiny percentage of people has 0:16:50.920 --> 0:16:54.160 unbelievable wealth while so many other people are start gaining. 0:16:54.200 --> 0:16:55.800 Let me tell you this, this is not just an 0:16:55.800 --> 0:17:00.280 American issue. Right now. In this planet on Earth, the 0:17:00.480 --> 0:17:04.159 six wealthiest people on this planet have more wealth in 0:17:04.240 --> 0:17:07.840 the bottom half of the world's population two point seven. 0:17:08.440 --> 0:17:11.119 It is crazy. It is crazy, and we got to 0:17:11.160 --> 0:17:13.600 deal with that. What would be a tax policy you 0:17:13.640 --> 0:17:17.239 would have sought. You want to raise the highest rate 0:17:17.320 --> 0:17:20.960 to what during Eisenhower's period, I think the higher syncome 0:17:21.000 --> 0:17:24.040 taxes something like that for the very, very very wealthy. 0:17:24.080 --> 0:17:27.280 And these are marginal rates. I mean that means at 0:17:27.320 --> 0:17:30.760 the very top, that's what you're gonna be paying. Uh. 0:17:31.440 --> 0:17:34.920 But also you have a situation where there are a 0:17:35.000 --> 0:17:39.600 lot of very profitable, large corporations. A general electric being 0:17:39.680 --> 0:17:42.520 one who in a giving year could make billions of 0:17:42.600 --> 0:17:44.560 dollars is making billions of dollars not paying a nickel 0:17:44.640 --> 0:17:47.119 and federal income tax. How is that possible? Because you 0:17:47.280 --> 0:17:50.400 stash your profits in the Cayman Islands and other tax savings. Whither, 0:17:50.520 --> 0:17:53.399 you're either you're an American company that benefits from being 0:17:53.400 --> 0:17:56.240 an American company or not. You want all that, you 0:17:56.320 --> 0:17:59.520 want all the benefits and other responsibilities. Yeah, well you 0:18:00.000 --> 0:18:01.919 out of quoting from my speeches here. Yeah, I mean 0:18:02.160 --> 0:18:03.880 that is I may do that from time to time. 0:18:04.280 --> 0:18:05.960 But you know, that is the issue. And it's certainly 0:18:06.000 --> 0:18:08.720 not just General Electric. Many of these companies. There's a 0:18:09.200 --> 0:18:11.560 funny thing that was responsible for that. One administration was 0:18:11.560 --> 0:18:15.280 responsible for that variety Republican and Democrat, but it is 0:18:15.600 --> 0:18:18.879 um there's a building in the Cayman Islands. This is 0:18:19.000 --> 0:18:21.679 really funny, and we got a picture of it. One building. 0:18:21.720 --> 0:18:25.760 I think it's a fourth story building, the Nomity Corporate Corporations. 0:18:25.840 --> 0:18:29.720 It houses something like eighteen thousand. You know, it's sold 0:18:29.800 --> 0:18:35.240 just like postal address for a corporation, their headquarters. Yeah, 0:18:36.400 --> 0:18:41.320 it's up above Duncan Donuts there. Now, I'm not that 0:18:41.440 --> 0:18:45.000 interested in the race and the campaign and the and 0:18:45.119 --> 0:18:49.920 the warfare analogies and so forth. But well, I'll just 0:18:50.040 --> 0:18:52.160 open with this illustration, which is I lived in an 0:18:52.160 --> 0:18:55.280 apartment building on Central Park West, and I was walking 0:18:55.320 --> 0:18:58.400 out of my building and I was walking then Senator 0:18:58.520 --> 0:19:02.439 Barack Obama, who was campaigning for the nomination, and Uh, 0:19:02.720 --> 0:19:04.479 I said high to him as I was passing him, 0:19:04.480 --> 0:19:06.119 and I walked out and thought, I think I met 0:19:06.160 --> 0:19:09.240 it under my breath, good luck to you, pal. You 0:19:09.320 --> 0:19:12.960 know she's gonna kick your ass. Her and the husband, 0:19:12.960 --> 0:19:15.119 in their whole network, which I've met these people over him, 0:19:15.119 --> 0:19:16.920 I've always felt, you know what I mean, It's always 0:19:16.960 --> 0:19:20.240 like you always feel the weight and the heft of 0:19:20.359 --> 0:19:22.640 the Clinton machine when you're around them and their friends 0:19:22.680 --> 0:19:26.200 and associates. They're so networked. And then of course he 0:19:26.320 --> 0:19:28.560 makes history and he wins the nomination. Then he beats 0:19:29.240 --> 0:19:32.760 the Vietnam War hero in the race. Unbelievable. What were 0:19:32.800 --> 0:19:35.720 the early vulnerabilities of Hillary Clinton's that you said? What 0:19:35.840 --> 0:19:37.920 wasn't even a vulnerability? We were. This is who we 0:19:38.040 --> 0:19:40.439 ended up taking on. We ended up taking on virtually 0:19:40.520 --> 0:19:43.879 all of the money class. Uh. We ended up taking 0:19:43.960 --> 0:19:48.000 on every Democratic governor in America. We took on all 0:19:48.040 --> 0:19:51.240 the United States senators Democratic senators except for one, Jeff 0:19:51.280 --> 0:19:54.960 Merkley of Oregon ends make almost little Democratic members of 0:19:55.000 --> 0:19:57.680 the House, almost little Democratic mayors. So we took on 0:19:57.760 --> 0:20:01.800 the entire democratic establishment, all of virtually all of the 0:20:01.880 --> 0:20:05.840 super delegates. That's what we were up against. But one 0:20:05.880 --> 0:20:08.920 of the things that we understood from day one is 0:20:09.359 --> 0:20:13.960 that it was important for us not to develop a 0:20:14.040 --> 0:20:17.880 superpack that we were. We said to the people, look, um, 0:20:18.080 --> 0:20:20.520 we're not going out the billionaires. We don't have a superpack. 0:20:20.560 --> 0:20:23.560 When people can contribute a hundred thousand bucks, no pack, right, 0:20:23.600 --> 0:20:26.360 no pack, and we end up is is now well known, 0:20:26.600 --> 0:20:32.640 getting millions of contributors uh contributions averaging twenty seven dollars 0:20:32.680 --> 0:20:35.919 a piece, and that was historical. See and what it showed. 0:20:36.040 --> 0:20:38.639 It showed a couple of things. It showed that if 0:20:38.720 --> 0:20:41.639 you stood up and were prepared to fight for working people, 0:20:42.240 --> 0:20:45.240 working people would contribute to your campaigns. There was a 0:20:46.440 --> 0:20:49.160 study of the people who contributed to my campaign done 0:20:49.200 --> 0:20:51.280 by I think was the l A Times, and it 0:20:51.400 --> 0:20:53.359 kind of almost moved me. It was hard to read 0:20:54.080 --> 0:20:57.120 about the number of low income people, people who really 0:20:57.160 --> 0:20:59.240 did not have a lot of money, who flipped in 0:20:59.320 --> 0:21:02.560 ten bucks at went bucks. They gave what they can 0:21:02.800 --> 0:21:07.400 and during the cost of the campaign, with one vague exception, 0:21:07.480 --> 0:21:09.920 it really wasn't. In that case. I never did a 0:21:10.520 --> 0:21:14.240 high dollar fundraise. I never went to a rich person's house. 0:21:14.320 --> 0:21:17.320 And we had all these folks there, you know, the 0:21:17.480 --> 0:21:20.600 degree that we did fundraises, they were, you know, fifty 0:21:20.680 --> 0:21:22.200