Softballs! Kerry's busy preparing a snappy answer to Bush's shoulder-shrugging chortles, so here, I answer them.
By CHARLES MURRAY, a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and the author, most recently, of "Human Accomplishment: The Pursuit of Excellence in the Arts and Sciences, 800 B.C. to 1950"
Five percent of Americans pay 54 percent of all personal income taxes. They do not use more government services than other Americans; they use fewer. Why is this fair?
It's fair because that 5 percent of Americans earned nearly the same proportion of all income. Earn 50% of all income, pay 50% of all income taxes. Fair's fair. In fact, they should be paying much more than that -- because they disproportionately benefited from our governmental infrastructure. Big businesses actually benefit -- and not suffer, like you are always saying you do -- from governmental regulations, like the court systems we provide to make sure people pay their bills, the roads we build to bring goods to markets, the defense department we make to insure that we live in a world safe enough to do business. When you take home a million dollar paycheck, you're sure benefiitting from these services a lot more than people who take home a $20,000 paycheck. Which is why I'm going to bring a middle-class tax-cut, while rolling back the Bush tax cut for the wealthy. It's time for those of us -- and I think you and I are the only people in the room I'm talking about -- to give back.
Would you be willing to sponsor tort reform that requires plaintiffs to have used common sense before being eligible for damages?
Absolutely. The country would benefit if everyone used common sense. Have that legislation on my desk in the morning.
You promise to create millions of jobs, but many people who run businesses say that nothing in your life has taught you how much effort, risk and sometimes heartbreak goes into creating one real job. Could you describe your experiences when you last had to meet a payroll, or when your boss had to meet a payroll?
As a Senator, I do not go through the same excruciating choices as do the small business owners in this country -- struggling to get by in this struggling economy. One point six million jobs have been lost under George Bush's watch -- the first president in seventy years to lose jobs while in office. We have fallen behind in creating jobs in this country -- not just where we should be, but where we were the first day George Bush showed up to work in 2001 -- which, if you believe Michael Moore, was sometime in August, after vacation.
The fact of the matter is that, creating even one job is an excruciating decision for each small business owner. But it's a much easier decision if our economy is not suffering like it is now -- and it is a decision that I will make easier, not just for one business owner, but for millions of business owners, so that businesses can grow, and ad millions of jobs to this economy -- not remove millions of jobs, such as George Bush has done.
By CHRISTIE WHITMAN, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency from 2001 to 2003
You have been critical of President Bush's rejection of the Kyoto Protocol, yet in 1997 you joined 94 of your Senate colleagues in effectively rejecting its terms. What has changed to make you accept now what you then rejected?
The United States cannot solve the world's environmental problems alone -- which is a difference between George Bush and myself. George Bush pulled the United States out of the Kyoto treaty in 2001, which has now been signed or ratified by over 100 countries -- including England, Germany, France, Austrailia, Russia, Japan, China -- as well as developing economies like South Korea, Indonesia, and Vietnam.
Oh, and Poland.
In 1997, the US congress examined terms very similar to those in the Kyoto protocol, and we asked ourselves, what would happen if the US tried to go it alone in saving the world's environment. We all realized -- and really, you'd have to be an idiot not to realize this -- that if we forced companies in the US to stick to tough environmental standards, they'd simply pick up and go to another country.
You see, we simply cannot do this alone. That's why, in 1998, the Kyoto protocol was founded, and why in 1998, the United States become one of the first signers of the Kyoto protocol -- to insure that these laws protecting the envioronment are enforced everywhere. That's also why it was bad for the United States for George Bush to change course, and remove us from Kyoto protocol in 2001 -- second thing he did in office, I think, after taking a vacation, if you believe Michael Moore.
The president's Clear Skies proposal calls for a 70 percent reduction in some of the worst air pollutants, including mercury, over the next decade. While the current Clean Air Act has made a difference, it is cumbersome, it almost always involves lengthy litigation that delays any benefits, and it doesn't set any specific level for the reduction of mercury. Why haven't you led the fight to avoid lawsuits and instead demand the results the president has advocated?
You quote one of the important contributions the Clear Skies proposal would actually make a difference on -- Mercury. In fact, many people, for many years, have fought to have better standards for mercury made Environmental policy, and this Administration --- I think you were in charge of some of this while you were head of the EPA under George Bush, Ms. Whitman -- blocked those initiatives. Now, the President wants to make it easier for factories to pollute US skies, as a giveaway to his friends, and he tries to make it palatable by calling it "Clear Skies", and by including one single improvement which he has blocked time and time again.
When I am President, we will push forward board changes in improving US environmental regulations, to protect the air and water of all our citizens. If you're interested Christy, I'll invite you back to head up that effort, so you can see what it feels like to be in an administration where the EPA improves the air and water for all our citizens, and not be ordered to protect the polluters, who happen to be the President's friends.
By STEPHEN L. CARTER, a professor of law at Yale and the author, most recently, of "The Emperor of Ocean Park," a novel
During the long period it would take to carry out your plan to improve the public schools, would you, in the interest of racial justice, support a system of vouchers to enable the parents of poor inner-city children to pay for private schooling to cover the transitional years? Throughout the five or more years that your plan envisions, many inner-city children will continue to receive substandard educations, and to suffer in other material and spiritual ways.
Professor Carter, our nation's educational system is in a bad way. It is not a time to squander opportunities to fix it, and it is not a time to trample on the good will of the millions of educators, administration and parents -- stakeholders in our nation's school systems -- as well as the children whose futures depend on it. We had an opportunity in 2001 to improve the nation's schools, and the country came together behind the President's bi-partisan proposal, called "No Child Left Behind". What's happened, after that sweeping change was passed, was the President has refused to pass into law over $40B in support for carrying it out. Pass the bill, but don't fund i so that it fails -- that's what George Bush has done for education in this country. And now we're left with a long-term problem.
The long term solution is not vouchers to private schools. We could issue those, and for 4-5 years, they'd work great. But in 4-5 years, private tuition would go up -- and we'd see politicians like George Bush refusing to fund it -- just like he did when he got the bill for "No Child Left Behind". Those kids, 4-5 years down the line, would be stuck with a tuition bill which they couldn't pay -- and politicians like George Bush would simply shrug their shoulders, like he does by not paying for "No Child Left Behind", and the public schools -- which are Americas promise to all its citizens to provide a good education -- would in the meantime be wrecked by loosing all those students. There would be no public schools for students to go back to 4-5 years down the line.
The short-term solution is indeed vouchers -- but it is not vouchers to private schools, but vouchers to public schools. Parents should be able to pick what public schools they go to. This will permit us to send money to the schools which are successful, while remaining committed to our promise of a good education to all of America's citizens.
If the answer to the first question is no, would you call on well-to-do Democrats to show their support for public education, and for the poor, by voluntarily sending their children to the schools that the inner-city parents are required to use? After all, a sudden influx of middle-class families might force a cure for many of those schools' deficiencies.
I will do one better, Prof. Carter, I will demand that our public schools be so good that everyone -- Democrats and Republicans alike -- will demand entry into them. I'm not talking about supporting a weak system by showing up, I'm talking about making a strong system which everyone will want to be a part of.
If the answer to the second question is no, are there any sacrifices that you would call upon middle-class Americans to make for the sake of improving the condition of the worst-off among us?
Absolutely. Improving the nation's educational system takes money, lots of it, and we cannot pay for that if George Bush's $400B tax deficits continue, and increase for another four years. I'm going to address it by rolling back Bush's tax cut for people earning over $200,000, and by bringing our economy back onto sure footing. What I call upon middle-class Americans to do, if they want to see this happen, is to show up and vote for me on November 2.
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