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Transcripts

February 19, 2004

Host: Michael Grant
Topics:
· Congressman Jeff Flake
· Cactus League
In-Studio Guests:
· Jeff Flake, Arizona Republican congressman
· Jaye Tibshraeny, Republican state senator

>> Michael Grant:
Tonight on "Horizon," Arizona Congressman Jeff Flake not too happy with current spending levels in Congress. He'll talk about that and more. The crack of the bat will soon ring out in the Valley as cactus league spring training starts. We'll tell you about a bill that would prevent taxpayer money being used to reshuffle the cactus league deck.

>>> Michael Grant:
Good evening, I'm Michael Grant. Representative Jeff Flake spoke earlier this afternoon to the Republican liberty caucus of Arizona about runaway congressional spending. That is one topic we will discuss with the Republican who despite his party affiliation has not been afraid to criticize the Republican controlled Congress and White House about spending. Here now to talk about spending and more is Arizona Republican congressman Jeff Flake. Congressman, good to see you again.

>> Jeff Flake:
Thanks for having me on.

>> Michael Grant:
It's been a while. You know, spending a billion here, billion there, pretty soon adds up to real money. It's such a large subject when you deal with the federal budget. Is there any particular area or areas you're going to focus? I know you're talking to the liberty caucus shortly.

>> Jeff Flake:
There is some spending that is happening that's necessary. Certainly spending for the war for national defense. That's a primary role of the federal government. We need to do that spending. As George Washington said years and years ago, if you spend a little money to deter, you spend less to repel, and I think money spent in the war on terrorism in this way is effective. Having said that, we're spending a lot of money domestically we shouldn't be, domestic, non-defense, discretionary spending has risen dramatically under Republicans, and for which we ourselves have the blame.

>> Michael Grant:
Is that true with the current Bush budget? Because the line is, in gross, homeland security up, defense up, all other areas controlled to 1% or less.

>> Jeff Flake:
Right. The non-defense discretionary budget under the Bush proposal is about .05%, and that's good. It's finally getting ahold on it. It's risen about 12% over the past couple of years. So our line is if it's risen that far, we ought to be able to cut it a little, and so we the Republican study committee or the conservatives in the house have offered a budget that cuts non-defense discretionary by 1% and cuts entitlement spending by 1% or lowers it 1%, and it's not going to get rid of the deficit in a year, but it will get rid of a lot faster than the current plan.

>> Michael Grant:
I know one of the things being mentioned, in fact, Senator Kyl mentioned it last night on the program is this giant transportation bill, which he actually said the president might veto. Can you in broad terms outline what seems to be most offensive about this giant transportation bill?

>> Jeff Flake:
It's giant. There is about $257 billion over the next six years in the highway user fund that can be allocated for road construction around the country, and the problem is the Senate bill is about $318 billion. So it includes monies that aren't available. So you would have to dip into the general fund, have a tax increase or do other gimmicks that simply spend other monies, and that shouldn't be done. The president has taken a tough line on this, and we hope that if the trend continues and this bill actually becomes -- comes to the president's desk that he does veto it. He needs to veto something.

>> Michael Grant:
I'm doing some fast math here. Did I read you correctly that's about a $60 billion spread between the two?

>> Jeff Flake:
That's right. The House Bill is worse. The House Bill is about $375 billion, so we've got to do substantial cutting there. So the House Bill contemplates a 5-cent-a-gallon gas tax increase. I think we need like a kick in the head right now. We just shouldn't be raising taxes on an economy like this or any time.

>> Michael Grant:
Now, on the other hand, there are people, I think, who justifiably point out that in some areas of the country the transportation infrastructure is aged and falling down, in other areas of the country, and we might be located in one, you need a lot more transportation infrastructure simply because of growth.

>> Jeff Flake:
Nobody can make that case better than Arizona can, we're the fastest growing state and have the best needs there, and yet we get ripped off by the formula. We're supposed to get 90.5 cents back. When you look at the real numbers it's only about 85%, and part of that is due to the tremendous increase in earmarks. When individual members, and there are only a few, who get these earmarks, an earmark is basically saying I have a project in my district that warrants taxpayer funding and I'm just going to earmark a piece of that money, a piece of the pie and bring it into my district, when they do that, the problem is that takes money out of the pot, which feeds the formula, where Arizona gets its money. So if Florida gets a big mark or a member from Florida get anker mark, as was the case in the omnibus bill, it takes out of Arizona's formula. There were so many earmarks, over 600 in the omnibus bill, that over a billion dollars was taken out of the highway formula, and Arizona got the short end of the stick again. And we'll continue to get that until we have a system where if you get an earmark -- we shouldn't have the earmarks at all, frankly, but if you get an earmark it comes out of your formula, not everyone else. I have an amendment to to that effect. I think we will get traction on. There are just a few members who get most of the earmarks. Most of the others bear the brunt.

>> Michael Grant:
Prescription drug benefit, the entitlement it turns out, and I wasn't exactly shocked, the estimate was $140 billion short on the prescription drug entitlement. Is that wasteful spending? Pork? Bad idea? What?

>> Jeff Flake:
Bad idea. Bad idea. We in one fell swoop signing that legislation added about $7 trillion none funded liabilities to the Medicare system over 75 years. Now, I'm concerned about the deficit, but I'm far more concerned about long-term liabilities that the government has, in Social Security, and in Medicare, those are growing dramatically, and why in the world we would take this bill and add that much more I don't know. It was bad policy and bad politics, frankly, for Republicans. It just -- part of the Rob is so little of the bill actually goes to the problem we identified. Problem is there are a lot of seniors who can't afford prescription drugs. Rather than targeting the benefit at them, we spent a lot of money on other things, in fact, only 1 in $16 in the bill actually goes to buy prescription drugs for seniors who don't have them. As they realize that's all they're getting, they're going to come screaming back what did you do for us and for us Republicans it's a bad thing.

>> Michael Grant:
One of the provisions I find most mysterious is a provision that says the federal government is prohibited from negotiating discounts with prescription drug companies. Doesn't that give a lot of fuel to the arguments that there's really big money behind this bill and in particular big money behind the bush administration?

>> Jeff Flake:
You're right, and the problem is you can't have that provision in some areas of government, like the VA, they can negotiate prices for drugs, but Medicare can't.

>> Michael Grant:
Why is it in there? Is that the answer? Did prescription drug companies buy it?

>> Jeff Flake:
Oh, I don't know if I want to ascribe motives like that, but yes, I think that's frankly it. Prescription drug --

>> Michael Grant:
It's difficult to come up with any other answer.

>> Jeff Flake:
Right. They had a tremendous influence on the outcome of this bill.

>> Michael Grant:
Let me shift to the other side politically, though. The point is made that Democrats have been beating up Republicans with Medicare and Social Security for a long time, and this took that issue off the 2004 election cycle table.

>> Jeff Flake:
Well, let me just say, I should have said before, the Democrats crying about the fiscal irresponsibility here is laughable. The Democrats' bill was about $800 billion. We had a $400 billion bill, which I is the first to concede was bad one, I did not vote for it, but the Democrats wanted to spend a lot more. But, no, I don't think it took it off the table. Frankly. I think that seniors when they realize this is all we're getting, or this is what we have to jump through to get it, they're going to blame Republicans.

>> Michael Grant:
If I recall correctly, don't you have premiums of about $1600 to buy at least an initial $1800 or $2 thousand how in coverage?

>> Jeff Flake:
It's extremely cumbersome. You pay a certain amount up to a certain amount then pay all the amount to a certain point, there's a so-called doughnut hole --

>> Michael Grant:
You have a gap from 2 grand to 5 grand?

>> Jeff Flake:
That's right, and the AARP are coming back saying you have to fill that hole and you have to spend more money to do that. I think we got ourselves in a big, big problem.

>> Michael Grant:
Stan Barnes, a potential opponent, says that you put a fiscal philosophy over representational responsibility. What do you say to that?

>> Jeff Flake:
I would say he's just wrong. Stan is a good man and I enjoy having him in the race, but he's just wrong there. We need fiscal responsibility in Washington and I'm not going to go be part of the problem, and in terms of earmarks, what I have said is that I won't seek an earmark for money that hasn't been authorized and I have the same position that John McCain has always had there and it's a good position to have there, because it freeze you up. The way it is in Washington, once you have an earmark in a bill, once you've got money for a transportation museum or a bus stop or whatever else you manage to rope a couple million or few hundred thousand for, you are obligated to vote for that bill, because if you don't, then they take this money out, and you have just -- you've given yourself up. You have marginalized yourself by getting those earmarks, and that isn't how it ought to be in Washington but that's how it is right now. So I'm -- I just think that for somebody to go back there and play I'm going to play the game, you marginalize yourself if you do that.

>> Michael Grant:
But to the extent I vote for you to send you back as my warrior to do battle with these other guys that are just earmarking these bills right and left and I say, listen, I want you to get me an earmark for a trolley in Phoenix or a street in Tucson or whatever the case may be, isn't that one of the functions of a congressional representative?

>> Jeff Flake:
Well, part of the problem is those earmarks rarely go to roadways. I don't think there has been an inch of roadway built in Maricopa County in the past decade with an earmark. What they usually go for is projects that really don't have anything to do with mobility, even if they're in the transportation bill.

>> Michael Grant:
Transportation museum.

>> Jeff Flake:
Yeah, I guess to the extent that you're at a museum and not on the road clogging it up. So you can say you relieved congestion. Let me tell you, the problem is big as we have to change it. Arizona, we don't have a chairman of the appropriations committee in our state. We don't have these people, abdomen until we do, we are going to get shorted by this process and we've got to change it, and you can't go back there and say I'm going to change this process while at the same time saying, hey, I'm going to get whatever I can you was it just doesn't work that way.

>> Michael Grant:
Let me touch on some other subjects. You are headed for Iraq next week?

>> Jeff Flake:
Right.

>> Michael Grant:
The purpose?

>> Jeff Flake:
See what's going on there. What I am particularly concerned about, obviously all of us are concerned about the security situation to make sure we're in a position where we can leave, but what I'm most concerned about is the economic situation. I'm concerned that we may be leaving the oil industry largely unchanged there, when we ought to be decentralizing the ownership. There have been a lot of proposals, one from Dr. Vernon Smith, who was at the U of A for a long time and now at George Mason, got a Nobel prize for experimental economics, he had a great piece in the "Wall Street Journal" a while ago that talked about some hybrid plan of the Alaska dividend program that gives every Iraqi share in the oil industry because until we decentralize the power there, I just don't think we can have a long-term viable solution by saying, just, as long as we get certain percentage of Shiites, certain percentage of Sunni and Kurd they will live happily ever after.

>> Michael Grant:
What is the current system, state controlled?

>> Jeff Flake:
State controlled. We have to change. There are a lot of schemes to change that. There are a lot of hybrids to take. We have to do something. There has been some good work done by the Peruvian key must notist, Desoto. They're doing work in Egypt on private property issues. A lot of what they're doing there can be transferred to Iraq and that's what I would like to do. I've called for a hearing in the international relation committee to look at that aspect of what we're doing in Iraq because if we want long-term stability there, we've got to change the dynamic, because oil has been a curse to people in the Middle East for centuries, and it will continue to be until we decentralize the ownership of it.

>> Michael Grant:
At what point, though, do we become the impeerist -- impeer you willist Yankee, I mean, as good an idea we think these things are, at what point do you not superimpose that as opposed to saying to them, listen, here's some good advice but we've guaranteed free elections, you make the decision?

>> Jeff Flake:
What we've tried to do is bring freedom to the people there, and they're not going to have freedom for very long as long as the oil industry remains in state hands. And I don't think we'll be accused of imperialism if we're simply saying, here, let's give everybody in Iraq, every Iraqi a stake in the economic future of the country. That's what this is all about.

>> Michael Grant:
You sure the French or the Russians --

>> Jeff Flake:
Well, those that look for contracts to rebuild may see it differently, but I don't think we're there to please the French or the Russians. We ought to be there for the Iraqi people.

>> Michael Grant:
Where do you think capitol hill is at all on guest workers and immigration?

>> Jeff Flake:
Well, we've got a good start. Myself and congressman Kolbe and Senator McCain introduce add bill last July, and the president introduced his initiative, which borrowed heavily from our bill and we're pleased at that. It's an election year. It's going to be tough to actually move something. We had some hearings in the Senate on guest worker bills in general. Our bill was talked about at that point. It's obviously the closest to the president's proposal. But I'd be surprised if anything moved in the next couple of months. It's just tough in an election year. We're trying. We would like to move it this year, but I think most likely it will move after the next election, assuming the president is reelected, he wants to have this. >>

>> Michael Grant:
You know, there has been a lot of talk about President Bush having troubles with the conservative base and one of the issues cited is, in fact, his proposal on guest workers. From your own personal experience, because you share certainly a large portion of that conservative base, have you had difficulties in Arizona as a result of being so up front on that particular issue? >>

>> Jeff Flake:
What I find is that when you go around and actually explain what the proposal is, that it's not an amnesty, that we're not doing what we did in 1986, that we're actually pushing for employer enforcement, this is actually a different deal, and when you explain that the worst for Arizona is the status quo, I mean, we're getting killed, our healthcare costs, education, criminal justice, federal government makes out quite well but Arizona really bears the brunt as far as the taxpayers here, and we can't continue to have this system, and until we recognize there are people here -- there's going to be a foreign workforce in this country, it can be illegal or it can be legal, and we have to decide which we want, and frankly, unless -- you know, if you have a problem, unless you can quantify it and know what it is, you can't manage it. Right now we have no idea how many are here.

>> Michael Grant:
One of the problems that some people have with it, and -- even people who recognize the economic reality of it say, yeah, but, you know, we keep trying this, in the mid-1980s we had amnesty to sort of wipe the slate clean and get off to a fresh start, and what it seems to encourage instead is just more breaking of different laws.

>> Jeff Flake:
Right. We did two things wrong in '86. One, we had an amnesty. Amnesty is an unconditional pardon for an offense, and we basically said if you've been here this long, we're going to give you a path to citizenship. Our bill says if you're here illegally, you can go home, and that's basically if you're caught here illegally, that's the punishment, deportment. You can do that and start from there, or you can pay a $1500 fine and then go to the back of line. So this is no amnesty at all. Second, ours contemplates serious workplace enforcement afterwards. When somebody has a biometric card that identifies them as a temporary worker, there will be no excuse for employers to hire people who are illegal, and you can't blame employers now, because they do their level best but all they can do is ask for cards and identification. If they ask for too much, they'll get sued. They're in an off position now. We have the worst possible situation in the world right now with the status quo.

>> Michael Grant:
All right. Congressman Jeff Flake, we appreciate your time and the information.

>> Jeff Flake:
Thank you.

>> Michael Grant:
It's almost time for peanuts and crackerjacks, green grass and hotdogs, as Arizona's cactus league season is set to begin the 13 -- 12-team league is expected to draw 1.1 million fans this season. Last year pumped $202 million into Arizona's economy. A bill was recently introduced at the legislature that would prevent tax money from being used to move teams within the league. We will talk to the sponsor of that bill but first Mike Sauceda tells us more about the cactus league shuffle.

>> Mike Sauceda:
This is the City of Goodyear's field of dreams, where the city and the Anaheim angels would like to locate a baseball stadium for the angels spring training but for Tempe it could represent the field of nightmares. Right now Tempe Diablo Stadium is where the Angels train. But Goodyear would like that to change by the 2006 season.

>> Jim Cavanaugh:
It's important that people understand that we didn't invite them to come. We'd love to have them. But the initiative here was strictly from the Angels' ownership.

>> Mike Sauceda:
Cavanaugh, the Mayor, says Artie Moreno owner of the angels also owns part of the land where they hope to build a stadium. In addition, he has a stake in the 22,000 acre Estrella subdivision. They asked for $20 million in taxpayer money to cover about half the cost of money for building the stadium for the new angels.

>> Jim Cavanaugh:
At that point the direction from the TSA was they would be willing to provide up to $20 million to fund the construction of a stadium in Goodyear, but it was based on contingencies, contingent that another team would fill the void which they were leaving in Tempe, and there would be construction enhancements in Tempe and Scottsdale.

>> Mike Sauceda:
All that would be contingent on major league baseball but a bill has been introduced in the Arizona legislature that would prevent TSA monies to go to teams that move within the cactus league. Senate bill 1264 sponsored by Senator Jay Tibshraeny would require teams be brought in from outside the state to replace a team in the cactus league team. Cavanaugh says the bill is not needed and would hurt the deal in Goodyear.

>> Jim Cavanaugh:
Would it very likely kill it. It would deny any TSA funding for movement of the sort that we were contemplating. I.E., moving a team from instate to another instate residence.

>> Mike Sauceda:
Tempe Mayor Neal Giuliano is not sure the bill is needed.

>> Neil Giuliano:
I'm not sure we need the state legislature to Wade into this issue, but if they are going to, they ought to make sure the playing field is kept level and provide everyone the same opportunities, and I think that's where the amendments are taking the bill.

>> Mike Sauceda:
But he says at this point the angels are obligated to stay in Tempe.

>> Neil Giuliano:
Well, the latest we've heard and these are very complex discussions and negotiations really at the major league baseball level more than anything else is that the angels may not be able to move as quickly as they had first desired to a new facility in Goodyear for a number of reasons, and that it's likely they will fulfill their contractual obligation and play in Tempe diablo stadium through the spring training season of 2007.

>> Mike Sauceda:
For now this dirt field will remain empty and even if the angels get some TSA money it wouldn't come until 2017. But at diablo stadium, the bleachers will soon be full.

>> Michael Grant:
Stepping up to the plate to tell us more about the bill is Republican state senator Jaye Tibshraeny of Chandler. Senator, thanks for being here.

>> Jay Tibshraeny:
Thanks for having me.

>> Michael Grant:
Jaye, first outline your bill and then I want to get to some amendments because I think some amendment may have been added that address some of the information we just heard.

>> Jay Tibshraeny:
The bill was it would prevent a team from moving out of a tax funded stadium into another taxpayer funded stadium. I have amended it to handle any concerns, including the good Mayor that discussed it, and that amendment would basically allow movement as long as another team was moving into that facility, either from out of state or in another instance in that particular amendment a team that was in a shared stadium in the state, and there's a couple teams do that that. So we wanted to accommodate that. I think by doing that amendment we handled what is trying to happen here with the surprise stadium and what have you.

>> Michael Grant:
Now, as I understand it, there is a strange tinkers to ebbers to chance, we're overplaying the baseball analogies tonight, plan that's supposed to occur. The Angels are supposed to go west, the White Sox are supposed to land in Tempe and somebody is supposed to go to Tucson?

>> Jay Tibshraeny:
Supposed to bring a new team from the Florida league in to take the White Sox place. I don't know who that team would be, Cleveland or Detroit or who, but -- that's the intent of the law s to bring in new teams. This just -- this particular agreement, though, and the reason I did the bill, was to pretty much protect the taxpayers and make sure that that actually happens, because it's one thing to say this is our intention, but it's another thing when the pressure gets on and the team starts threatening to leave to have that happen. So by putting this in state law, we're just assuring the taxpayers what they intended to have happen would happen, and that we don't end up with taxpayer-funded facilities sitting empty so that that team can go to another taxpayer-funded facility. That money is the car rental money, the prop 302 money that was used to build the Cardinals stadium and what have you.

>> Michael Grant:
Is that your response to Mayor Giuliano's comment, that he's not sure that the legislative intervention here is necessary?

>> Jay Tibshraeny:
It is, and I saw the good Mayor of Tempe today, actually, down at the capital, and we talked briefly on it, but there's always good intentions, but one thing I found, about, especially the sports and this taxpayer funded stuff, if -- when you get down under the pressure of the negotiations, a lot of things change and a lot of good intentions, TSA having a good intention, sometimes they go by the wayside. All we're doing is memorializing what they're saying their intention to do is, which is not to leave empty taxpayer funded stadiums. He understood that.

>> Michael Grant:
However, you will still have the possible faux phenomena of if you build it, will they stay? They could come, but you can get a bunch of these stadiums and maybe somebody makes a better offer out of state down the road.

>> Jay Tibshraeny:
Out of state or in state?

>> Michael Grant:
Out of state.

>> Jay Tibshraeny:
They could leave. But that's to -- in the Tempe case, if in fact they left and nobody took their place in that stadium, TSA has used taxpayer money in the mid-90s to upgrade that facility, it's a beautiful facility with a beautiful location. They're currently getting ready to put more taxpayer money in that with the angels getting ready to leave in 2007. Again if the intentions of the TSA is they will put another team in there, that's what we want to see. Otherwise it doesn't make sense to put more renovation must not knee there and then they leave in two years.

>> Michael Grant:
All right. Senator Jay Tibshraeny, thank you for joining us.

>> Jay Tibshraeny:
Thanks for having me.

>> Michael Grant:
Procedurally this is moving when?

>> Jay Tibshraeny:
It is going to cow next week. It will get out of the Senate next week.

>> Michael Grant:
Forgot to ask you the procedural question. You can see a transcript of tonight's show by going to our website at www.kaet.asu.edu once you get to the homepage, click on the "Horizon" link. You'll find it on the left side of the page and that will take you to the transcript plus information about upcoming shows.

>> Michael Grant:
Progress is reported in the prison standoff investigation this week. Bishop Thomas O'Brien is found guilty in his hit and run trial. And Governor Napolitano's name is mentioned as a possible vice-presidential candidate. These issues and more Friday night at 7:00.

>> Michael Grant:
We will undoubtedly be discussing more legislation that took place at the state legislature just this week. Please join us for the Friday edition. Thanks very much for being here on a Thursday. I'm Michael Grant. Have a great one. Good night.

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