McConnell Center Distinguished Speaker Series
Senator Scott Brown
2010
Gary Gregg: [00:00:00] Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming out today on this
beautiful day. We appreciate your support of the McConnell Center and our programs.
We support you being here. I’m Gary Gregg, and I have the honor of directing the
McConnell Center here at the University of Louisville. This is a very busy day for us, a
very big day for us. Not only do we have Senator Brown with us today, but at four
o’clock we have one of the great experts on Benjamin Franklin, Rosalind Remer, with us.
If you are interested in that, it will be a scintillating, intellectual experience at four
o’clock today at the Chao Auditorium in Ekstrom Library, free and open to the public.
We hope some of you might make it out for that.
I might also ask you to take a look when you get a chance at our website, if you
haven’t recently. It’s undergone some really tremendous changes and growth. We have
everything from podcasts on there on The Simpsons TV show and Shakespeare to what it
might mean to be a gentleman, and I think you might find something of interest there.
Today’s program is just the latest in what has been for almost twenty years now
the premier political lecture series in the commonwealth and probably in the region.
We’ve hosted five secretaries of states, ambassadors, heads of foreign governments,
Pulitzer Prize-winning authors, members of the Supreme Court of the United States, and
a real Who’s Who, a bipartisan Who’s Who, of United States senators from Ted Kennedy
to Scott Brown here today.
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[00:01:58] Here at the University of Louisville we have the great benefit of
having some tremendous leadership that has led this university over the last few years to
real tremendous changes and growth in programs and buildings and academic reputation.
Part of all of those major decisions has been our vice president and provost, Shirley
Willihnganz. How one person can do all that she does, including being this university’s
chief academic officer and chief operations officer, I have no idea, but perhaps she will
explain at some point to us.
Ladies and gentlemen, please rise and welcome our provost, Shirley Willihnganz,
Senator Scott Brown, and Senator Mitch McConnell. [applause]
Shirley Willihnganz: [00:03:31] Good afternoon, everyone. It’s wonderful to see you all
here today. You know, one of the things a great university does is it offers great
intellectual opportunities for our students, our faculty, and staff, and certainly these
conversations that Senator McConnell has allowed by bringing major political figures to
our campus so that we have an opportunity to hear directly from them about the events
that are shaping our world and our nation is one of the very best things that happens here
at the university. I’m so glad that you are all here today to participate in this.
It’s now my honor to introduce a friend to the university who is really one of our
very best friends, Senator Mitch McConnell. I know that one of the things that we most
appreciate is not only is he a graduate of the University of Louisville, and we’re
extraordinarily proud of all that he’s accomplished, but, as I said earlier, he’s one of the
best friends that you could have. We appreciate especially his efforts on behalf of the
University of Louisville.
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This event is sponsored by the McConnell Center. The McConnell Center, of
course, was set up to make sure that the very best and brightest students in Kentucky
stayed in Kentucky, because we know if students go away from home, they may become
invested in somewhere and not come back. And we know that if Kentucky is to grow and
thrive, those very best brains need to stay here to help us deal with the very real problems
that we are facing. Since its inception, the McConnell Center has brought the brightest
students in Kentucky and, again, as I said earlier, so many wonderful speakers have come
to our campus.
[00:04:57] I also want to mention that the senator has been extraordinarily helpful
in making it possible to do a lot of the things that have helped this university grow as
dramatically as it has in the last few years. Whenever anyone asks me about earmarks, I
tell them that I am a great fan, because so many of those earmarks have come to the
university and allowed us to do things like build the Shumaker Research Building on this
campus, the Clinical and Translational Research Building downtown, the expansion to
the library. I could go on, because it is a very long list, but those gifts that are coming to
our university through that earmark process are a way that our tax dollars are really
making sure that this university stays at the forefront and is able to do its job of educating
the next generation of people and finding those scientific discoveries that will make this a
better place to live, because the economic development coming from them and for the
quality of life that are produced for our people.
So for those things, I want to thank Senator McConnell and introduce you to him
now. Senator. [applause]
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Senator Mitch McConnell: [00:06:22] Well, thank you very much, Shirley, and thank
you also for the wonderful job you and Jim Ramsey are doing in leading this university
into heights, shall I say, that I had never thought imaginable. We’re really proud of the
great job you’ve done here.
As many of you know, particularly the Scholars, the Center is dear to my heart.
As a kid growing up not very far from here, I had dreams of the future, and thanks to the
help and encouragement of others, I was able to reach some of those dreams. And it’s
been my hope over the years that bringing prominent men and women here to share their
stories and advice that many other young men and women from Kentucky would be
helped in achieving their dreams in life as well. In this, we have been scrupulously
bipartisan. Having dreams isn’t limited to one political ideology or another, and every
person we’ve hosted here over the years, Democrat and Republican alike, has had a
unique and important story to tell. What unites all of them is vision, determination, a
certain inner strength, and the fact that they were citizens of a nation where achieving
one’s dreams is only limited by one’s ability to keep at it.
Our guest speakers have had something else in common too: every one of them
was still making history when they came here, and yet few of them have made the kind of
instant impact on national affairs that today’s speaker did when he stunned the political
world earlier this year by winning a U.S. Senate seat that had been held for the legendary
Ted Kennedy for nearly fifty years. In winning that race, Senator Brown became the first
Republican senator from Massachusetts to win an election since 1972 and, thereby, an
instant celebrity. He also broke the Democrat super majority in the Senate, making me a
very happy man. [audience laughter] And he became the first McConnell Center speaker
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to replace a previous one in the U.S. Senate. As some of you may recall, we were
honored to have my friend Ted Kennedy here in 2006.
[00:08:41] As a graduate of Tufts University and Boston College Law School,
Senator Brown began his political career as a town assessor and as a town selectman in
Wrentham. From there he was elected to the Massachusetts House and then the
Massachusetts Senate. He is a thirty-year member of the Massachusetts Army National
Guard, with the rank of lieutenant colonel in the JAG Corps, and he was awarded the
Army Commendation Medal for Meritorious Service following the attacks of 9/11.
Senator Brown and his wife, Gail, with whom Elaine and I have become good
friends, with their two daughters, he was a lawyer, a triathlete, and even more unusual for
the Senate, a former model. [audience laughter and applause] Since his election, he’s
quickly become an important voice on a range of national issues. He’s been a terrific
colleague and a great presence in our conference, and I couldn’t be happier to have him
here with us today.
Ladies and gentlemen, Senator Scott Brown. [applause]
Senator Scott Brown: [00:10:03] Thank you so much. Mr. Leader, thank you. My
modeling days are long gone, but I appreciate you bringing it up, really. It’s a good way
to start. [audience laughter] Oh, my goodness.
Well, thank you for having me here today at the McConnell Center. Who would
have thought? You know, I’m Scott Brown from Wrentham. I still have a truck; it has
216,000 miles on it. So anyone who thinks that it was a gimmick or an act, the barn
jacket, listen, my daughter owns a horse. When I go to the barn, I’m going to wear a barn
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jacket. She bought it for me, so I’m going to wear it. Then the truck was so I didn’t have
the horse stuff smelling, and you all down here know about horses, that’s for sure. So I
got a truck and threw all the stuff in back. And go figure. I’m Scott Brown from
Wrentham driving around in my barn jacket in the truck as I’ve done for I don’t know
how many years, and it’s who I am. I’m a regular guy, probably like many of you here
who started out from humble beginnings, and now I’m here in Louisville talking to you
all, talking to McConnell Scholars, a lot of the students from the various high schools, a
lot of leaders not only in the community but throughout the university.
[00:11:14] As I was out there talking to a few folks, they said, “Senator, we’re
honored. We’re honored you’re here. We’re honored you’re here.” No, sir, I’m honored
that you would invite me to be here, Provost, and all of you for giving me such a warm
welcome. I’m honored to be a United States senator, one of 100 people who actually gets
to participate in a daily basis on the issues that are affecting us in our everyday lives.
Since being elected, I’ve done some amazing things, I have to tell you. Who
would have ever thought, number one, that I would be here? I had the opportunity to go
to Afghanistan and Pakistan, visiting our troops, been to Israel. I touched where Jesus
was crucified, was in the tomb where he ascended to heaven. I was in the Dead Sea. I’ve
been to Dubai and Jordan meeting with kings and queens and prime ministers and
business leaders, all the way down to the poorest farmer. You know what they talk
about, Mr. Leader? You know what they talk about, folks? They talk about jobs. It’s all
they talk about: jobs so that Al Qaida will not infiltrate their youth; jobs so they can get
their produce to market so they can provide for their families; jobs so they can secure
their cities and towns so we can go home to our families.
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And you know what? Since I’ve been in the United States Senate now about nine
months, we spent about ten or eleven days actually talking about jobs. Now, this seems
upside down to me. Here I am, I’m overseas in all these countries, and that’s all they talk
about, and then I’m in the United States Senate, and that’s the one thing we don’t talk
about. It’s very, very frustrating.
[00:12:53] I know that, as the Leader said, there were some pretty impressive and
distinguished speakers who have spoken before me. To name a few, Secretary Powell,
who I have developed a very positive relationship; Secretary Rice; and, as noted, my
predecessor, Senator Kennedy. And I don’t quite know how I got to deserve the honor of
coming down here, as I mentioned earlier. But I know many of you are rising stars. How
many actually followed my election? If you can kind of raise your hand. A few of them.
How many people actually saw my victory speech? Raise your hand. All right. Well,
how many people here actually have an interest in politics and in maybe doing something
like I do, raise your hand, whether locally or—raise your hand. [audience laughter] No,
seriously, raise your hand. A few people. Well, let me tell you, all you guys out there
and all you fathers potentially, or father’s-to-be, do not ever, ever say your daughters are
available on national TV. Okay? [audience laughter] It’ll cost you, believe me. It only
cost me a used GMC Jeep. That’s all it cost me.
But all joking aside, I’ve been very impressed in my tour. I told the Leader, I
said, “Mr. Leader, I love you. You know, I love you. I’m happy to come down, but I’m
not coming unless I can meet Coach Pitino.” [audience laughter] And I did. I got to
meet the coach. He’s actually taller than I thought. [audience laughter] But I got to see
the new Center and speak with him. I’m obviously a big fan. Being from Boston, he had
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a relationship—it wasn’t the best—with the Celtics, but I know he’s a lot happier here
and doing a lot of wonderful things for the university.
[00:14:30] I know, as I said, some of you did follow the election, as the raise of
the hands, and let me just kind of talk a little bit about the election and then I’ll move it
forward to other areas. But for the folks who followed the election, I’d say the first major
issue that people spoke about was the healthcare bill that was basically rammed down our
throats through reconciliation, a parliamentary procedure, basically so I couldn’t
participate in the process. The majority party was doing everything and anything they
could to push that bill through. It was a half a trillion in Medicare cuts, longer lines,
lesser coverage. I’m from Massachusetts. We have 98 percent of our people insured, so
for my state and other states like Massachusetts, it really didn’t make any sense, but they
wanted to do it. And the true numbers are coming out now, over a trillion dollars in
actual costs, and Americans were screaming that they didn’t want it. They just said, “No,
we don’t want it. We’d rather have our own individual states tell the federal government
or ask the federal government for help and say, ‘Listen, federal government, what can
you do to incentivize us to get our people insured?’” Because there are certain people
throughout our great country that don’t have anything, and they need our help, and I
believe very strongly we should help them. But I don’t believe that we should have a
one-size-fits-all total government domination of an industry where it’s going to cost over
a trillion dollars. We’re going to have a half a trillion in Medicare cuts and those longer
lines and lesser coverages.
So I was elected not only because of the healthcare bill; because of the way we
treat terrorists. I believe that they should be treated as enemy combatants and not
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ordinary criminals and immediately give them their Miranda rights and treated like
everybody else.
[00:16:14] And then you talk also about our debt and our spending and the
economic woes that we have. A whole host of things led to me being the forty-first
senator. I’m still the forty-first senator, Mr. Leader. You know that. But so is every
other Republican. So my election, as the Leader pointed out—and be honest, who here
does not know what cloture means? Raise your hand. Be honest. Thank you, young
man. He’s going to be a good politician someday. One person raised his hand. A couple
did.
Well, let me tell you what cloture is, for those who don’t know. Cloture is a vote,
a procedural vote where we say, okay, we’ve done something for seven weeks, we’re
going to move to close the vote and move on. So it’s basically done, next, next, and so
there’s going to be times when I’m going to be the forty-first vote, as the Leader knows.
I am going to be the forty-first vote when I comes to if we’re going to increase spending,
I’m going to be the forty-first vote. If we’re going to increase our taxes, I’m going to be
the forty-first vote. If we’re going to do some of those things that are just so crazy that
you say, “My goodness, what are they doing in Washington?” I’m going to be the fortyfirst vote to stop it.
But I’m also going to be the sixtieth vote, as the Leader knows, when there are
issues that I feel will get our economy moving and get our country moving, because I
don’t know if you’ve noticed, we’re in deep trouble. We have some very, very real and
serious problems where it’s putting us at a global competitive disadvantage. For
example, why does it take China, India, nine, ten, eleven months to build a 500,000-
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square-foot building, start to finish, give you the keys, here you go, and open up when it
takes us in Massachusetts and maybe here even in Louisville and other surrounding areas
in the state, two, three, four years just to get through the zoning board of appeals? I
mean, how do you compete? How do we compete as a global power economically?
Well, we can’t, and we need to do some very, very draconian things to get us cracking.
[00:18:25] But as I said, the healthcare bill wasn’t the only issue. Taxes,
spending, jobs were at the forefront of the voters’ minds in Massachusetts, and voters in
my state and throughout the country were just sick and tired of the rhetoric and the high
taxes and the binge spending, not only in Massachusetts, but we had three Speakers
indicted in a row. We had recently a senator plead guilty to putting money down her shirt
in a bribery situation.
We have the worst business climate in Massachusetts in decades, according to the
Associated Industries of Massachusetts and the NFIB Massachusetts. High
unemployment, there’s a sense of uncertainty where people are just saying, “You know
what? I’d love to hire your son, your mother, your father, your friend. I don’t know
what’s going to happen. I don’t know what the tax structure’s going to be. I don’t know
what the regulatory scheme is going to be. I don’t know what’s next.”
So what do they do? It reminds me when Roberto Durán was in there fighting
and they said, “No mas, no mas.” They just can’t take any more. They don’t know
whether to go up, go down, go left, go right. So you know what they’re doing? They’re
just in the fetal position, just cringing, just cringing, saying, “What’s next?”
And the voters in Massachusetts, you know what they said? “Enough. We’re
going to send somebody down there who’s going to be an independent voter and
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thinker.” And with all due respect, I don’t work for Mitch McConnell. I love him to
death. He’s a great Leader. And I don’t work for Harry Reid either. I work for the
people of Massachusetts, because when I look at a bill, I’m going to go down there and
look at five things. Does it increase taxes? Does it increase the deficit? Is it good for
Massachusetts? Is it good for the country? Does it create jobs? If it hits those five
things, hits those five things, then I’m more than likely going to support it, because I’m
not going to be the guy who’s just going to hold everything up and come to a grinding
halt, because we don’t have that opportunity. We don’t have that luxury anymore to play
games.
[00:20:18] We have to get our country back on track, moving. We have to get our
country moving to the point where we can compete economically in a global basis,
because if we don’t, it’s going to affect how we deal with our military and our ability to
defend ourselves. I mean, who here knows what the national debt is right now? Raise
your hand. What is it? Yes, you, right there in the pearls, nice. Yes, you. What do you
think? Yes.
Audience member: [00:20:47] [unclear].
Brown: [00:20:47] Yeah, pretty darn close. It’s getting close to $14 trillion. It’s about
13.5, I believe, now, 4, 5. And when I went down there about eight and a half months
ago, $11.95 trillion. What is it now? What was it? Thirteen, almost $14 trillion, folks.
That’s twelve zeros. That’s a lot of money. How do your kids, your grandkids, and your
great-grandkids, how do you pay that back? And all that money that we had at one point,
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that was used for space exploration, roads and bridges, all the wonderful things that the
provost just pointed out, it’s debt service to China. All that money’s gone, so now we
have very little actually to work with. So when you hear them fighting and screaming
over money, how do they figure it out? What do they do? Just print more money. Just
print more money. That’s the way we do it. Just pass a stimulus bill, another trillion
here, trillion there. They don’t get it.
[00:21:42] And you know what’s interesting? Back home in Massachusetts, the
people that are making decisions with our money, and a lot of the people making
decisions on Capitol Hill, they’ve never even had a job. They’ve never actually worked
in the private sector. And how many people here actually own businesses? Raise your
hand. How many times have you actually woken up in the middle of the night and said,
“Oh, my gosh, I can’t—.” Last night? [audience laughter] That’s a perfect example. “I
can’t pay Mary. I have to let Al go. I can’t pay that insurance bill. I can’t pay that light
bill.” People are hurting, not only here in Kentucky but throughout the country. They’re
tired. They’re angry. They’re tired of business as usual. They’re tired of the political
rhetoric. And they’ve had enough. And I’ll tell you what. I fully believe that the
Congress has not spent enough—and when you hear, hey, the Republicans apparently are
“the Party of No.” Did you know that, Mr. Leader? We are “the Party of No.”
With all due respect, once again, I voted with the Democrats on occasion. As I
said, if they hit those five parameters, I have voted with the Democrats. Do you know
how many times they’ve voted with me on issues or the Leader on issues? Zero. So
who’s “the Party of No”?
You can’t tell me we can’t fix the 1099 debacle? How many people know about
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that, you business owners? Yeah. We can’t fix that? We’ve had how many, three votes
on that, Mr. Leader, I think on that? Should have passed overnight. Now they want to
obviously do it because we have the numbers to actually force some type of fix on that.
[00:23:15] But I have a speech. I never use it. [audience laughter] I guess I
should probably look and see what I’m supposed to say next. But I will say that when I
got to Washington, there was a tremendous amount, and still is, of media scrutiny, and
also just speculation amongst the voters of Massachusetts, the voters throughout the
country, as to what kind of senator I was actually going to be. And I made it very clear to
the Leader that I wouldn’t be a rubber stamp for anyone, and I think that I’m hopeful that
the new breed of senators coming in will also be an independent breed, looking to find
ways to get our country moving again.
I don’t want to spend too much time looking back and be a political analyst or
pundit as to what happened during my election or even this most recent election, except
that I’m very thankful that people throughout the country, not so much in Massachusetts
and some other parts of the country, but they recognize that we’re going in the wrong
direction and that we have some balance now. We have the ability to force a different
type of approach to solving our very real problems.
But now, I guess my hope—and I’ve thought a lot about it, going back, I think, on
the fifteenth, I’m hopeful that the majority party and the president got the message that
Washington has to start listening to the people throughout this country. It’s no more “My
way or the highway.” I’m hopeful that not only with my election, but the most recent
election in, obviously, the House of Representatives and in the Senate that there’s a very
strong message, and my hope is that the president comes more to the center and starts to
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govern and lead like President Clinton did to try to tackle the very real issues, like the
1099 thing. It should be done yesterday, getting our country back on track with a whole
host of things. My feeling, without even blinking, don’t even have to think about it, the
one thing that can get us back on track is getting our economy fixed, period. It’s about
jobs. It’s about hiring people. It’s about getting certainty in an uncertain business
climate by taking and getting those unemployment lines so they’re less.
[00:25:39] Even though you are all still students, I know you realize that your
parents many times have sacrificed so you could come to a beautiful school like this. I
know you all, probably in the summer or when you’re home on break, you get jobs. I’ll
tell you what. It’s very, very difficult, as you know, to get jobs right now, and we need to
fix that. People looking as long as six months to a year and longer. The unemployment
extension benefits are continuing on, and you hear all the time, “Hey, sir, lovely, great
kid, great girl, love you, but we can’t hire. We don’t know what the certainty is.”
Our economy is still a grim picture, and I’m hopeful, as I said, that the president
and the majority party in the Senate has gotten the message that we need to focus on the
one thing that can get us refocused. And what can we do? What do you think we can
do? What are, like, the easiest fixes? Well, the first, in my mind, is to address the
uncertainty when it comes to our taxes. Taxes are too high, they need to be lowered,
especially on businesses. I remember when we left we heard about, well, we’re going to
close the corporate tax loophole, the offshore, the foreign tax loophole. Remember that,
Mr. Leader, the offshore tax loophole they were going to close? It’s like giving
businesses a cupcake, say, “Here’s your cupcake. We’re going to give you a payroll tax
reduction.” And we’re going to pay for it by closing the offshore loophole, the tax
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loophole. Well, what they don’t tell you is it’s not going to work. They’re going to take
that sledgehammer that is that closure, and they’re going to basically crush that cupcake,
whack you over the head with it, because they’re not lowering the corporate tax rate from
35 percent to make it more competitive. So now we have a high corporate tax structure
and we’re going close another so-called corporate loophole. Yeah, that’ll keep ’em
coming, just rushing back to the United States. That’ll work.
[00:27:38] If we lower this, then maybe it would work, maybe we could get some
support. When I offered the across-the-board payroll tax reduction—remember when I
did that when I first got there—by using unallocated stimulus dollars fully paid for,
immediate money in people’s pockets up to $600 per person, got like four Democrats to
go along with it. But now all of a sudden, it’s a good idea, but we’re going to pay for it
by closing a corporate loophole. Give me a break. Really. I mean, give me a break. If
we can do it better, we should be doing it better. So we need to get our tax structure
under control, because if we don’t do that, and then we couple it by the out-of-control
spending, and we’re spending, they’re spending up there. Trust me. I’m a fiscal
conservative like no other. I’ve never voted for a tax increase in all my years of elective
office, and I can tell you they’re spending. Government’s too big, needs to be less
intrusive, and businesses, large and small, need to have that consistency, need to have
that uncertainty lifted so they can be reenergized, and they need to be encouraged to grow
and create jobs.
As I said earlier, we are in a global competitive market. We’re not just competing
Kentucky against Iowa or Massachusetts against New Hampshire; we’re competing
against all other countries throughout this world. And if we do a few things, obviously
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get the tax structure squared away, get the tax extenders, 1099 fix, R&D tax credit,
making it permanent, maybe startups having a zero-percent capital gains rate, give them
targeted business incentives, doing the things that make just common sense that at least
keeps us in the ballgame. But more and more spending and bigger and bigger
government is absolutely not the answer.
[00:29:29] I chuckle a lot when I’m out jogging, and I am a triathlete and I still
compete, but I do most of my thinking when I’m out either running, biking, swimming,
lifting. That’s a joke, but anyway, thanks for laughing after the fact. [audience laughter]
Yeah, I know, I have you so entranced, you’re like, “Oh, my gosh. I was in a good mood
till the senator came here and started talking about how poor the economy is.”
But I do a lot of thinking and I just see the programs that are being pushed and the
bureaucracy that’s being created. And let me just say that I believe there is a role for
government, I do, good government, but also a government needs to know when to get
out of the way and let individual businesses and citizens create jobs and solve their own
fiscal problems. There’s not always a government answer. The government cannot
create jobs, but our large and small businesses can. People like you, who raised your
hand, are having issues with regard to the businesses, they can figure out how to get it
done. They can figure out how to hire that new employee.
As you all know, if you’re paying attention, especially these young McConnell
Scholars here, that the job market, private sector’s shrunk about eight million jobs. In
Massachusetts, 300,000 people are unemployed. When people tell me and ask me,
“Scott, what can we do? What can you do down there? You’re just one guy.” Well,
right now I’m the forty-first senator, and when I get back there, we’re going to have more
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senators who can actually force people to actually finally work on the things that can get
us working again.
When I ask those business owners what can we do, they say, “Well, listen, we like
occasional help. There may be a time when we need a safety net, but just leave us alone.
That’s what you can do, just get out of the way. Leave us alone.”
[00:31:23] Instead of working on solutions that will let us grow our economy,
they’re growing government, to the point of the federal workforce has grown by 3.4
percent just last year, non-defense spending is up 24 percent since 2008, and my question
is how are we going to pay for all this debt. I mean, how? Please tell me. I’m all ears.
I’m with the best and the brightest here at the McConnell Center. I mean, I’m all ears,
tell me, because I don’t see it right now with the way that things are going down in
Washington with the attitude and the arrogance of power that’s there right now where
they’re just ramming stuff through just for a sound bite.
Before we left, it was just for a commercial. We didn’t do anything that was
going to pass, right, Mr. Leader? It was just for a sound bite, and you saw them all, and
it’s a shame we missed a great opportunity to work on some things where people like me
and others wanted to get some things done.
I know that across this state and across this country there are people who are
trying to make a difference. They’re trying, whether they’re in politics or in their own
universities and businesses, they’re trying to make a difference. They’re trying to find
solutions. They’re trying to get their own individual businesses focused. They’re trying
to get their towns and cities up and running and making it attractive for businesses
coming here.
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But if you look at a lot of the things that are passing, I’ll just go right back to the
healthcare bill. When you pay for it by taxing medical device companies, for example, in
my state I have like over 250 of them. One company alone is $440 million to implement
that portion of the healthcare bill. So where’s that money coming from? Is it coming
from R&D, hires, expansion, growth, what? I mean, what’s the incentive for them to stay
in the United States versus going over to India or China or some other country where they
say, “Hey, come on. We love your business, love your jobs”?
[00:33:25] And you don’t know how hard businesses in my state, and probably
your state, are trying like the dickens to stay in business here. They want to hire these
young people. They want to hire all these people in back, summer or full-time positions,
but there’s so much confusion, uncertainty. They’re scared. So, as I said earlier, they’re
just kind of hunkering down.
And as I mentioned also, the corporate tax rate is the second highest, and we don’t
know where we’re going. I mean, gosh, just to get a new drug through the FDA—and we
have a lot of drug-manufacturing companies; I have visited some companies that are just
doing breathtaking things in our state, breathtaking—it just boggles the mind to see what
they’re doing. But to get those drugs or anything through the governmental process,
they’re spending tremendous amount more money, but they’re getting fewer drugs or
devices approved. So what are they doing? Going over to London, they’re going
overseas. They’re getting them approved there. They’re taking the back road, coming
through, still doing what they do. So what does that mean? It means no more expansion
in Massachusetts or throughout the areas that focus on these particular jobs.
I have said very publicly, along with the Leader, that we are spending way too
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much time on the wrong things. I call it fluff. On Beacon Hill, where I’m from, and
Capitol Hill, they can say that they’ve lost hundreds of thousands of jobs but the stimulus
bill worked, right? I mean, only in government can they tell you after you’ve lost—in
Massachusetts, for example, 21,000 jobs last month—that, “We’re on the right move.
We’re on the right path.” Well, with all due respect to the president and to the leaders
there, we’re not on the right path. We’re kind of just hanging on for dear life. People are
still hurting. They’re still uncertain. Gosh, just looking right here, one of the examples I
had, we have to get the tax policy correct. We have a zero-percent estate tax right now.
Zero. You’ve heard about the billionaires who have died. Steinbrenner, zero, the
government got zero. You know what? It could be 55 percent at the end of this year, so
how does that create certainty? Let me see. Zero or 55, zero or 55?
[00:35:55] Then you look at the corporate tax rate or you look at the capital gains
rates, rates on dividends, what’s it going to be? Well, we’re kind of running out of time,
about less than two months before we get our act together. Well, what will happen?
We’ll have one of the largest tax increases in the history of our country. And I love it
when they say “those Bush tax cuts.” All due respect, it was something that was
suggested by the president that was passed by Congress that’s been tax policy for ten
years. In the middle of a two-year recession, we’re going to raise taxes on people? Are
you kidding me? I mean, we need some certainty. We need to start focusing on the
things that are very, very important. Extend, as I said, the tax policies, making sure that
we can get the R&D tax credit permanent, looking at the 1099 fix, doing a top-to-bottom
review of every federal program. How about holding the line on federal spending,
federal hires, federal pay increases?
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I’ll give you an example that’s off message here. I’m the ranking member of a
contracting section within the Homeland Security, I believe, arm, and we had a hearing
on Arlington National Cemetery, right? You all heard about that. They’re burying
people with other people. The graves are mismarked. Your loved one, when they get
buried and they give the ultimate sacrifice, they’re on a cue card in a room somewhere
instead of doing it on a nice iPad or something, putting it on a computer. My gosh, we
only spend billions and billions and billions of dollars. Why don’t we do it right? A
waste of money, a waste of time, a blemish to the people who have given the ultimate
sacrifice.
[00:37:38] Medicare, the waste, fraud, and abuse. Do you know what happens
when we do some contracting with a group and they mess up? Not only do we honor the
contract, we give them a bonus. Wouldn’t that be great? You don’t go to class, you
don’t study, you should get an F but you get an A, and then they promote you. I mean,
come on. I don’t get it, folks. I just don’t understand where we’re heading in terms of
getting our fiscal house in order.
You can see kind of the theme here. I’m talking about jobs and the debt and the
uncertainty, but then also brings opportunity. That also brings amazing opportunity to
get our country lean and mean and get our government agencies lean and mean, like
you’ve probably done here at the university during the tough times, like the city councils
have done here in the city, like you’ve all done in your households. You’ve become lean
and mean. You’ve learned to do a lot better with a lot less. They don’t do it in the
federal government. If they have a problem, they just print more money. But there is
opportunity with the change of leaders now in the House. There can be an opportunity to
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push back a little bit with some of the policies that I feel are potentially crippling our
country and our economy. You have Leader McConnell here leading a band of brothers
and sisters who are trying to fight, and for every single issue that will focus on our
economy.
[00:39:17] And you say, “Scott, you haven’t talked about the other things.” I’ve
got to tell you, folks, I don’t think there’s anything more important right now than our
economy and getting jobs for people. I don’t think there’s anything more important. In
trying to analyze it all, and I do this regularly to the point where I lay up at night and I
can’t sleep, I say, “Well, what can I do? I’m just one guy. I’m Scott Brown from
Wrentham.” The barn jacket’s right outside in the Leader’s car, and the truck’s got
216,000 miles on it now, and what can I do? Well, one of the things I can do is use this
right here, talk to these cameras that are looking at us right here, and use this bully pulpit
to say, you know what? We can do better. We can do better. Every single day I get up, I
say to myself, “What can I do better? How can I be a better person?” Because I might
not be here tomorrow. I could, God forbid, something happen on the way home, and at
least I will be left with the thought that I came and spoke to about 280 people and told
them that I challenge these young people especially here and out back to do better, to
make a difference, get involved, and you’re all involved because you’re all here.
One of my biggest fears is that we get lazy and we don’t fight for the things that
we believe in and that we don’t work to find the commonality that—listen, I’m a
Republican from Massachusetts. You kidding me? Right? You guys are saying,
“What’s a Republican?” [audience laughter] Yeah, you’re saying, “God, they have
Republicans in Massachusetts?” That’s what you’re really saying. I know you are. I’ve
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heard it. Yeah, but you know what? I also feel that it shouldn’t be a little letter at the end
of my name dictating who I am and what I stand for. I’m an American first. I’m
somebody who served my country in the military and still serving. I just did my rangefiring and got my shot in my arm the other day. I’m still serving, somebody who takes
the safety and security of our country, aside from my wife and my kids, that’s what I take
most seriously, is trying to get our country on track, and I can use this bully pulpit to do
that and battle with the president every single day, and the majority party every single
day, challenging them to do better and to get us back on track, because these young
people here deserve it. We all deserve it. We all deserve having a country where we’re
the world leaders, not only militarily but economically, to the point where, you know,
we’re kind of more balanced. We don’t mind going out to the movies and a dinner with
our wife and kids. We don’t mind sending our kids to a good school or a better school.
We don’t mind having to work an extra job, because we get it. We’re balanced. We can
do it. We see the certainty. We’re seeing kind of the light at the end of the tunnel. Once
again, I’m so hopeful that Washington has got this very important message that was sent
a few days ago.
[00:42:31] And as usual, I didn’t say one thing that was in my speech, but I think
I conveyed the thoughts that are in my heart, which is we can do better, there’s a lot of
opportunity. I’m proud to be a United States senator, representing not only
Massachusetts but really every single one of you out here. And I’m proud to know the
Leader and rely on his guidance as a mentor, because I don’t know it all, but I’m learning
pretty darn fast how to do it better, make a difference, be a better person. People back
home say, “Scott, have you changed? Have you changed, Scott?” Do you think I’ve
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changed? [audience laughter] Yeah, I don’t think I’ve changed, but what I’ve learned is
that we’re spending too much, we’re taxing too much, we’re not attacking and doing the
things that are most important to get us back on track. And I’ve changed because I’ve
come to this wonderful university and I got to meet one of my idols, Rick Pitino, so I’m
all good. So I want to thank you. I’m looking forward to your questions, and thank you
for your time. [applause]
Gregg: [00:44:07] Thank you, Senator Brown, for bringing that unused speech but the
passion with you, from Massachusetts.
We have time for a few questions. Please state them as questions and as
succinctly as possible and not statements. We have John Weber at this corner of the
room. John, put your hand up. John Weber here, Vice Chair of the McConnell Scholars.
If you’re on this side, put your hand up, get his attention. He’ll come around to you to
ask your question.
On this side, we have the chair of our McConnell Scholars, Mary Kate Lindsey.
Mary Kate gets to ask someone to ask the first question. Mary Kate.
Mary Kate Lindsey: [00:44:47] Senator Brown, we want to thank you again for being
here today, and we want to thank all of you for being with us as well. The McConnell
Center Civics Education Program just held a contest for Kentucky high school students,
and about a dozen classes throughout the state participated. We have five of those classes
here with us today, and our friend Sean [phonetic] from Davis County High School is
here to give his class’s winning question.
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Sean _____: [00:45:15] Senator Brown, I know you said you didn’t want to be a political
analyst, but looking back on the midterm elections, I was wondering what you think the
Tea Party Movement, what effect it will have on the two-party system that currently
exists in American government.
Brown: [00:45:28] Well, first of all, you’re right, I’m not an analyst. I do know that in
Massachusetts, the Tea Party in my election played a role, like over 1,200,000 other
people did. What is a Tea Party member? In my opinion, it’s somebody who’s
concerned about the fiscal and financial future of our country, and they’re concerned
about our overspending, our overtaxation, the growing government, our national security.
In different parts of the country, they were more active and they played a larger role. In
other parts of the country, it wasn’t as important.
I know some of the folks that have come in, they got a tremendous amount of Tea
Party support, and I know we can agree on a bunch of things, that we are spending too
much, we are taxing too much, that we need to get our fiscal house in order. We’re
concerned about our national security. Those are the four most important things that I
just got through speaking about. So I’m hopeful we can find common ground, and I
know we can, because those are the four most important things we’re going to be dealing
with in the next legislative session. And what it has done also is it’s gotten people off
their couches and got them involved, not only in my state, but obviously here with Rand
and others throughout this part of the country. So thank you for your question.
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Gregg: [00:46:55] John.
Jade Snelling: [00:46:56] My name is Jade Snelling [phonetic], and I’m from Trimble
County High School. So, Senator Brown, it has been stated that you support nuclear
energy development and exploratory offshore drilling. If a bill were proposed regarding
this issue, what must it include in order for you to approve it and what would merit your
disapproval of the bill?
Brown: [00:47:16] Well, thank you. I’m not sure what bill you’re specifically referring
to, but I believe we need to step back from our dependence on foreign oil and basically
paying money to countries that hate us. So let’s start with that policy. And I believe that
we need to have a comprehensive total approach, and that is wind, solar, nuclear, hydro,
geo, thermal, coal, looking at conservation, R&D, tax credits, making them permanent,
looking at a whole host of things that we can do that, so we can step back.
When I was with the president and we were talking about energy policy, there’s
an effort, and was an effort, to pass a national energy tax in the middle of a two-year
recession, and it’s not going to happen, but I believe that we can find common ground in
attacking a lot of those low-hanging-fruit issues in some type of bill, which we’re
working on, actually, in my office, to try to find commonality once again to step back
from that dependence on foreign oil. But it’s not something that’s going to be solved
overnight, and I’m looking forward to the next legislative session, with the Leader’s
guidance, to try to make a difference and do just that. Thank you.
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Ty Wilburn: [00:48:27] I’m Ty Wilburn [phonetic], a local business owner. Hello,
Senator McConnell, nice to see you again. Senator Brown, great having you here.
Here’s my question. Senator Brown, you have lots of conversation about we need to get
things done. The Leader has said on a number of occasions that one of the things we
need to get done is to make sure we have the White House on the Republican side in
2012. How do you balance those goals?
Brown: [00:48:48] Well, I think it’s important. We’re in 2010 right now, and I’m living
in 2010. I’m not worried about 2012. I’m worried about November 15th when I get back
to session, trying to make sure that we don’t have a lame duck session that’s going to put
through stuff that people really don’t want that’s full of specific agendas. Anything that
we get through in lame duck, it’s got to be clean and it’s got to be focused on the
economy and getting people working again.
When you come to ’12, I think that’ll work itself out on its own. But what do we
do till then? Nothing? I’m not going to do nothing. I wasn’t sent down there to do
nothing. I’m going to try to find a way, as I said, to get our country moving again. I
mean, I’m very concerned not only, as I said, for our economy, but for our military and
the ability before we even—you know, if we sneeze, we’ve got to ask China or other
countries, “Can we wipe our nose?” And that’s unacceptable to me. In order to be
competitive militarily and economically, we need to do the things that I highlighted.
Katie Hoak: [00:49:55] I’m Katie Hoak [phonetic], representing Assumption High
School. Senator Brown, I was wondering, since you believe in tax cuts, what services
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should be cut?
Brown: [00:50:04] Well, I’m not sure that they’re related. When I said tax cuts, I didn’t
think I said tax cuts. I said we shouldn’t change the tax policy in the middle of a
recession that, in fact, will raise taxes. We don’t have a revenue problem; we have a
spending problem. And there are a whole host of things that we need to do to get that
done. And let’s just start with this. Let’s just say we take everything that’s being said,
we have a debt commission that’s coming forth, and let’s just say hypothetically they do
everything, that they do the top-to-bottom review of every federal program, they look at
the fraud, waste, and abuse and every other program, they put a hold on federal hires,
they look at entitlement issues, they try to do some cuts. Let’s just say hypothetically
they do a 5 percent across-the-board cut. Let’s say we do all those things, and we don’t
do the other things, i.e., get people working again and getting the economic engine
moving, because if we do that, the jobs and the taxes and all that revenue will come
screaming back into the tax base, which would give us the money to do all those things
that you’re referring to.
So there are some programs that are clearly outdated, and that’s why I’m a strong
believer—when the president said, when he first got elected, he was going to do a top-tobottom review of every federal program, I’d like it to start happening, because there are a
lot of programs that are just obsolete and we need to get them lean and mean. Where
other programs need money to do better, great. Where other programs are obsolete,
great. To list some specific ones right now, it’s not something I’m going to do, but I
think we need to highlight the issues I just referred to.
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Unidentified: [00:51:44] Mr. Senator, part of the problem, I think, now is, from what
you’ve been saying, that the government is operating terribly inefficiently, and that it’s
consuming money and it’s putting out very little changes that it’s predicting. What do
you think can be done to take the money, because so much of it is pouring into
Washington, take the money, use it better, and actually effect the changes that you’re
talking about?
Brown: [00:52:07] Well, that’s a good question. It’s a larger question, because let’s just
take the stimulus bill. The stimulus bill hasn’t created one new net job. As I said earlier,
only Beacon Hill, where I live, and probably where your capital is and in Washington,
they can say that, in fact, “Yeah, we’ve created jobs,” when they’ve had millions of jobs
lost, and in my state, about hundreds of thousands of jobs.
So what I’ve proposed is actually a lot of that stimulus money still has not been
used, and I would like to recapture that money and immediately put it either back in
paying down the deficit or looking to get it out the door and working on some of the
programs that the young lady was referring to that maybe can be helpful and do better, or
use it to address a lot of the other issues I just talked about.
Brian Hemmer: [00:52:54] Good afternoon, Senator. I’m Brian Hemmer [phonetic], a
senior from Trimble County High School. According to your voting record, you voted
against a House bill that created an executive Office of Education headed by a cabinet
secretary to improve policy coordination across all educational sectors. I was wondering
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what type of education improvements would you propose to our system.
Brown: [00:53:24] Well, you said I voted against a House bill. I’m not quite sure what
he’s referring to on that. But notwithstanding that, let’s take it just a step further. What’s
my position on education? I believe everyone should have a good education, and I
believe that we should the money effectively to make sure that it goes to the people that
need it most, and that’s the students. And the people, if there are some areas where they
need more tools and resources to better educate their kids, then that’s great. But I know
that right now in my state we’re battling with a lot of institutional issues where a lot of
that money isn’t being directed properly towards the individual students. We have
charter schools back home and a lot of different ways to educate our kids, which I’ve
supported and continue to support. But in my state, we traditionally have been doing
very well in MCAS testing and other national tests, and my fear has been that the—and
maybe this is what you’re referring to—that the president’s plan, the Race to the Top,
will actually bring us down quite a few levels in the way we educate our own kids. I
hope that helps. Thank you.
Abby Lasonia: [00:54:42] My name is Abby Lasonia [phonetic], and I’m representing
Somerset High School. Senator Brown, thank you for coming here today. According to
recent figures, over $400 billion has been spent in 2010’s midyear political ads, over 80
percent of which have been negative. How do you think this negativity has influenced
political campaigning and the overall atmosphere in Washington?
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Brown: [00:55:04] Making whose ads? Just the ads in general? Well, I can just only
speak about my race. My race was pretty vicious. Like I said, I’m a Republican from
Massachusetts. [audience laughter] I have the scars to prove it. I didn’t run one negative
ad. I chose not to. It’s something when I ran when I was down forty-some-odd points, I
remember sitting around the kitchen table. I have two daughters. My daughter Ayla was
on American Idol, and she’s actually leaving today to go entertain the troops singing later
today. And my youngest is a sophomore at Syracuse, which I know you guys—[audience
applause and laughter] They were very upset. Okay? That’s all I can tell you. You’ve
wrecked their bowl dreams, I think. [audience laughter]
But I remember sitting around the table, and my wife and daughters said, “Dad,
we love you to death, but, you know, you’re going to lose.” This is my own family.
[audience laughter] “And we want to be able to hold our heads high around town and
around the state.” My wife is a news reporter. My daughters are pretty public figures.
“We want to be able to hold our heads high, so promise us one thing, and that’s just to
run a very issues-oriented, positive campaign.” And that’s what I did.
The attacks that went against me were vicious, and I just went on TV with my ad
when that started, and it was right after my debate. I did my debate, if you had seen any
of that, that’s when I said, “It’s not the Kennedys’ seat. It’s not the Democrats’ seat. It’s
the people’s seat.” [applause] And I walked up to the Green Room, and the first
negative ad was being run. The next day, we already had it in the can. We already knew
what was coming, and it was an ad—you can go on ScottBrown.com and actually sign up
for our tweets and all that stuff, if you like. But it’ll show you those ads and that we said,
“You know what? By now you’ve heard the negative ads run against me by my opponent
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and her supporters. And we can do better. We should be talking about A, B, C, and D.
Shame on them. It’s time to focus on the issues.” And it resonated with people, because
they’re tired of it.
[00:57:18] But I’ll tell you what, negative advertising, if it didn’t work, they
wouldn’t do it, because you could have the nicest person, the most wonderful,
hardworking, great person, but if you throw these half-truths and twist around their
voting record and manipulate their records and their words, if you’re not informed, then
you may just start to believe it. And you know what? All I can encourage you and the
student that asked the question is, if you have a question, just pick up the phone and ask
the person and make sure you don’t believe the rhetoric, because you deserve better.
You’ll know when somebody’s done something wrong because it’s usually in the paper
and you can usually find out. I just try to stay very, very positive, because I have to go to
sleep at night, and I have to go home to a houseful of women. [audience laughter] No
offense, guys, or ladies, but it can get pretty vicious sometimes.
Gregg: [00:58:17] We have time for one last question.
Unidentified: [00:58:23] The United States is a world-dominant power. However, other
rising economies such as China threaten to change that balance. What do you propose
needs to be done to maintain the American supremacy on the world stage?
Brown: [00:58:38] Well, it’s certainly not going to be by raising taxes, right? It’s not
going to be by not fixing our tax system or our regulatory scheme. It’s not by doing
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everything we can do to make us less competitive. I can tell you that. But until we start
to focus on those issues that I noted in my speech and also that we’re talking about
now—I mean, you all know. You business owners that raised your hands, you know
what it’ll take to get you to hire those one or two extra people. You know it. And all of
you that are out looking at jobs and asking people to hire you, you know exactly what
they need. They need certainty and they need the ability to know what’s next, need a
level playing field, and you need to know that you can count on the government.
[00:59:22] On the one hand, they say it’s black. It’s going to black tomorrow.
It’s not going to be red or green or blue. It’s black. And one thing that people know
about me is that when I give you my word, it’s my word. And that’s what we don’t have.
We don’t have that consistent “Yes, this is what we’re going to do. This is how we’re
doing it and why we’re doing it,” so we can plan. You can’t plan, and until we can plan
and have that business certainty, we’re going to be flat. Our economy’s going to be flat,
if not a little bit more depressed, because you have the foreclosure market that’s
happening. There’s a lot of craziness going on with that. That could take that whole
bubble. We still have Frannie and Freddie, and I know in the financial reform, I know we
didn’t fix it. We still have to fix it. But you know what we were able to do, is we were
able to pull that bill that was going to be passed all the way back. So now it’s back in the
game. It’s like healthcare. We’re back. Now we’ve got some people. Now we can
really go and start to work on these issues that were passed, and there are a ton of
provisions within them that can be done better and fixed better or eliminated altogether.
And that’s what we’re going to try to figure out.
So let me just, if I could, having daughters about your ages, all you McConnell
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Scholars and the young people, I’m very encouraged to come here and hear the
wonderful questions and the warm welcome. To get up a o-dark-thirty in a snowstorm
back home and to come here and get this wonderful reception, it means a tremendous
amount. I want to thank you for that courtesy. Mr. Leader, I want to thank you for
inviting me and giving me the confidence to come down and not embarrass you.
[audience laughter] Provost, thank you, thank you very much. Thank you, everybody.
[applause]
Willihnganz: [01:01:25] So thank you all for being here today. Again, thank you, Gary
Gregg. You do a great job with all of this and putting it together, so thank you so much.
Senator, thank you again. Senator Brown, if you’d come forward, we have a small gift
for you. On behalf of the university, thank you so much for being here today.
Brown: [01:01:39] Is this season tickets? [audience laughter and applause]
[End of presentation]
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