Meet the Press transcript for Oct. 10, 2010 Mark Kirk, Alexi Giannoulias, Peggy Noonan, Joe Klein
MR. DAVID GREGORY: This Sunday, the countdown to November 2nd, Election Day. The president is on the trail trying to protect home turf, stumping for the Democrat vying for his old Senate seat.
(Videotape)
PRES. BARACK OBAMA: You can trust him. You can count on him.
(End videotape)
MR. GREGORY: As the GOP threatens to change the balance of power in Washington, the fight for the Illinois Senate seat is still too close to call. This morning we kick off our election year Senate debate series with a showdown between the Democrat, Illinois State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias, and the Republican, Congressman Mark Kirk. The big issues: jobs, spending and taxes, and the credibility questions dogging both candidates, making this an intensely negative campaign.
Then, our political roundtable on the bigger picture. How new jobless numbers affect the campaign, whether Democrats can make the election a closer contest than most expect, and another high-level departure from the White House. With us, Time magazine columnist Joe Klein and The Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan.
Announcer: From NBC News in Washington, MEET THE PRESS with David Gregory.
MR. GREGORY: Good morning. With only 23 days to go, the campaign team of President Obama and Vice President Biden heads to Philadelphia today to try to rally Democrats to turn out for Pennsylvania Senate candidate Joe Sestak. But here in Washington this morning it’s all eyes on the tight battle in Illinois.
(Videotape, October 7, 2010)
PRES. OBAMA: Hello, Chicago. Oh, it’s good to be home.
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(End videotape)
MR. GREGORY: The fight is personal for the president.
(Videotape, October 7, 2010)
PRES. OBAMA: In some very tough circumstances, in a tough political season, you know, he has not wavered. And that’s the kind of person that you want. That’s the kind of person that you know when the going gets tough in Washington will be fighting for you.
(End videotape)
MR. GREGORY: Democratic State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias, neck and neck with five-term Republican Congressman Mark Kirk, battling for perhaps the most famous Senate seat up for grabs in this midterm race: President Obama’s former seat. For the GOP, it’s the ultimate prize.
MR. CHUCK TODD: The fact of the matter is if Democrats hold the majority, it’ll be because they held the president’s Senate seat. If they lose the majority, it means that one of the seats they lost is the president’s Senate seat. That’s the ultimate repudiation if you’re a former Illinois senator now sitting in the Oval Office.
MR. GREGORY: It is also a race that was marred by scandal from the start. When President Obama left one end of Pennsylvania Avenue for the other, then-Governor Rod Blagojevich ignored objections from Democratic leaders and appointed a former state attorney general, Roland Burris, to the seat. Blagojevich was later arrested, charged with attempting to sell the president’s old Senate seat. Then the campaigning began and the scandals continued.
(Clip from campaign ad)
MR. GREGORY: Kirk, a Navy reservist, has a list of erroneous or exaggerated claims about his military record, including his service in the Gulf War and during the invasion of Iraq. And Giannoulias, a 34-year-old former college basketball star who played professionally in Greece, has been plagued with questions surrounding his family’s troubled bank and whether Giannoulias, at the time a senior loan officer at the bank, was aware of $20 million in loans to a pair of Chicago criminals.
MS. LYNN SWEET: If all you’re looking at is the negative side, you have a choice between a serial embellisher and a mob banker.
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MR. GREGORY: So how will Illinois voters decide, and what will the outcome say about this midterm campaign?
And joining me now, Republican Congressman Mark Kirk and Illinois State Treasurer Democrat Alexi Giannoulias.
Welcome to both of you to our studio and to this debate, MEET THE PRESS style. So there are no set rules. We’re sitting around this table, we’re going to have a conversation, and we’re going to go through the issues. And there’s a lot to get to, so let’s get to it.
I don’t have to tell you both, the specter of President Obama hangs over this race because indeed it was his Senate seat that you are now vying for. And it was on Election Day, November 4th, 2008, in Chicago, when the president and his family appeared after he was then the president-elect, and this is what he said.
(Videotape, November 4, 2008)
PRES. OBAMA: It’s been a long time coming. But tonight, because of what we did on this day, in this election, at this defining moment, change has come to America.
(End videotape)
MR. GREGORY: Mr. Giannoulias, let me start with you. How would you define the change that has come to America under President Barack Obama?
MR. ALEXI GIANNOULIAS: Well, I think it’s important to put things in context. And if you look at the mess that he inherited and the enormous challenges that he inherited—a trillion-dollar deficit, increasing job losses—I think he’s done everything he can to help turn this economy around. The question is, going forward, what more can we do? We focused our campaign on creating private sector jobs, we’ve talked about infrastructure, we’ve talked about moving forward with the next generation of clean energy, clean energy jobs, tax breaks to small businesses, a job creation tax credit for small business, a payroll tax holiday for low to moderate income workers, doing everything we can to get that $1.5 trillion that’s, quite frankly, sitting on the sidelines in the private sector, encouraging and promoting economic growth.
MR. GREGORY: But the country’s better off in this economic recession because of the change that President Obama brought?
MR. GIANNOULIAS: I think if you look at what would’ve happened if some of the measures weren’t taken—and again, they weren’t, weren’t perfect. For example, I think when you look at TARP, the bailouts for the biggest banks, something that Congressman Kirk voted for, I think I would’ve liked to have seen, as a, as a former community banker, some more oversight, some more accountability, requirement that these banks lend money to help increase access to capital, something we’ve done in the State Treasurer’s Office. I think that was a, a missed opportunity.
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MR. GREGORY: Congressman, you had said at a rally back in March, a GOP rally, that Obama, that we—about the president, “We are on the way to making this guy a one-termer.” How do you answer that question? How do you define the change he’s brought to America?
REP. MARK KIRK (R-IL): A tremendous amount of debt. I’ve got a chart here that shows our debt-to-GDP ratio. And while we did run deficits in the past, we now number our debt in trillions rather than in billions. And I think that represents a long-term danger, especially to the, the American dream. Every American born today owes $43,000 to the federal government the day she or he is born. And we are transferring a tremendous amount of debt to the new generation, much of it owed to overseas creditors who expect to be repaid by our children with interest.
MR. GREGORY: But, Congressman, as a Republican member of Congress, do you really want to stand by your party’s record on the debt going back since you came to Congress?
REP. KIRK: No. I’ve become very much of a fiscal hawk here. I foreswore earmarks for my own congressional district, we could save $66 billion right there. The Kirk Amendment passed in the House that attacked the bridge to nowhere, even though it was in a Republican district, the chairman of the House Transportation Committee, and now it’s actually the bridges to nowhere will not be built.
MR. GREGORY: All right, I want to come back to the debt in just a minute, but I want to talk about the number one issue, I think, which is jobs, on the minds of every—unemployment is 9.9 percent in Illinois. And look at this chart, which is really a tale of woe in this country. You go back to 2009 in August; since that point, unemployment has been at 9.5 percent or higher. That’s 14 straight months. Congressman Kirk, I’ll start with you. What do you do at this point as the federal government to spur private sector job creation?
REP. KIRK: First of all, we recognize that the stimulus has largely failed. A very small part of it even went to infrastructure development projects. It didn’t answer the question, what happens when all the borrowed money runs out? Secondly, this Congress has been very, very viciously anti-business—new taxes, new regulation. We need senators and congressmen that will back a pro-growth agenda. For example, my Small Business Bill of Rights, 10 new policies to help out the number one employers in Illinois and the United States, small business. Half of all the jobs, 80 percent of the job losses in the great recession. They can’t afford a Washington lobbyist to go find stimulus money or a Washington lawyer to wade through the latest 1,000-page bill that congressional leaders haven’t even read.
MR. GREGORY: So tax, tax relief, tax cuts, in your mind, is really the job creation answer.
REP. KIRK: Well, a pro-growth agenda.
MR. GREGORY: Yeah.
REP. KIRK: Like making sure we don’t pass legislation to take away your right to a secret ballot in a union election. My opponent wants to take that right away, called the Card Check bill. I think that’s a terrible idea.
MR. GREGORY: All right, Mr. Giannoulias, how do you answer the question, job creation?
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MR. GIANNOULIAS: I think one of the problem, I think one of the problems, quite frankly, is we have typical Washington, D.C., politicians who have forgotten what it’s like on Main Street. I’m the only candidate in this race who’s worked in the private sector. Congressman Kirk has been in Washington, D.C., for 20 years. If you’re thrilled with out-of-control spending, the out-of-control borrowing that has become the Washington, D.C., ethos, then Congressman Kirk is your man. I think what we have to do...
MR. GREGORY: My question is, what do you do to create private sector jobs, to put people back to work? What you just said doesn’t put anybody back to work, and that’s what people are wondering.
MR. GIANNOULIAS: So what we’ve done in, in the State Treasurer’s Office, for example, low interest loan programs, increasing access to capital. One of the biggest problems out there that I hear from my friends in the business community is that there’s no lending, that it’s tough to get a loan today. Even if you have a line of credit, it’s being tapped. So one of the first things that we need to do is find ways to increase liquidity, to increase access to capital, to make sure that $1.8 trillion that is sitting on the sidelines in the banking system, which can be leveraged to at least $18 trillion, we need to do everything we can to focus on that. We need to focus on green jobs: solar, wind, geothermal, biomass. There’s so many opportunities. But other countries like China are getting ahead of the curve.
MR. GREGORY: The government did do a lot with the stimulus, right? You had actually said the stimulus was not big enough. You’ve also said you’re going to lead a progressive caucus if you’re the senator from Illinois. Will you push the administration, if elected, to enact more stimulus, to spend more money to try to get more people back to work?
MR. GIANNOULIAS: If, if more stimulus means more tax cuts to small businesses, if, if more stimulus means middle class tax cuts, then I’m for it. I will tell you that we also have to keep in mind what the Recovery Act really did. A third of it was tax cuts to middle class families, a third of it was emergency measure to—emergency funding to state and municipalities, something that I’ve seen as state treasurer is important.
MR. GREGORY: But do you acknowledge it hasn’t done the trick? I mean, 14 months of unemployment. They said that it would—if you passed stimulus, it would—the unemployment would get to 8 point--8 percent; 9.5 percent for 14 straight months.
MR. GIANNOULIAS: I think, David, the bigger question is what would have happened—and it wasn’t flawlessly done. But if, if you take a look at what would have happened, I mean, do we need to see soup lines down the street to figure out what would have happened? We avoided—and all economists will tell you that millions of jobs were saved because of the Recovery Act, and we avoided a second Great Depression. That, that is a reality.
MR. GREGORY: All right, let me have you two engage on the big tax debate here. Congressman, do you think that the Bush-era tax cuts should be extended for all Americans?
REP. KIRK: Right. Like CNN just did a survey of economists...
MR. GREGORY: You believe that.
REP. KIRK: ...saying that they should not have a new big tax increase on December 31st. If you look what congressional leaders want to do, they want to hit the U.S. economy with a $900 billion tax increase on December 31st on top of the 10 new taxes that were in the healthcare bill, on top of the taxes that were in financial regulation bill, on top of the taxes that were in the August congressional legislation. I don’t think—the, the key danger here is will our policies increase the chance of a double-dip recession? If you look at the job numbers just last week, we have a significant danger of that. And taking more money out of the private economy and having the government perform as it has poorly done with the stimulus I don’t think is the right way to go.
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MR. GREGORY: But it’s interesting you’d say that. And you said just a moment ago, if I heard you right, that you’re a deficit hawk, a fiscal hawk.
REP. KIRK: That’s right.
MR. GREGORY: Well, back in 2004 you were part of this Republican Main Street Partnership. And as part of that group, you had a press release on 2004. I’m going to put some of it up on the screen. “Today the Republican Main Street Partnership, the largest organization of elected moderate Republicans in the nation, offered six principles for the fiscal year ‘05 budget resolution that were designed to put Congress on a path toward a balanced budget. These principles,” you said then, “stand for a key value that once we adopt the budget, we must have the tools to stick to it,” said Congressman Mark Kirk. Now, here was a key part of that: “Tax cuts should only be extended temporarily and limited to those that are due to expire in 2004.” Key point: “We simply can’t afford permanent and across-the-board extensions at this time.” That’s what you said then, when the...
REP. KIRK: Right.
MR. GREGORY: ...when the debt was about one-third of what it was today. Congressman, how can we afford to make permanent tax extensions now with the Bush tax cuts in this climate?
REP. KIRK: Because especially in this climate we have congressional leaders that are not interested in spending restraint at all. For example, I back spending restraint across the board; at the DOD, like no second engine for the F-35 fighter, closing down Joint Forces Command, across-the-board reductions. When you look at the state of the economy right now, you have to set a priority. And my top priority is the deficit of jobs and economic growth, and especially this perception that the United States could be falling behind especially Asian economies. If we go through all the tax increases that congressional leaders propose—and by the way, Congress is going to come back right after the election in this lame duck session of Congress with a new round of spending in a omnibus appropriation bill, and new tax increases.
FULL TEXT TRANSCRIPT: Meet the Press transcript for Oct. 10, 2010 Alexi Giannoulias, Mark Kirk, Peggy Noonan, Joe Klein
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