Transcripts For CSPAN The Communicators 20150124

Reason i do is or member this about our country. We are the only country in modern times who has as one of its three founding principles the pursuit of happiness. Think about what an extraordinary country this is. Its Founding Fathers not only put life and liberty as one of our founding principles, but that every american has a right to pursue happiness, happiness as they see it, as they define it, not as some emperor, king or imperial president tries to determine at 1600 pennsylvania avenue. We are not here to diagnose the problems. The question is how do we create that america again how to renew our country. Country so each and every person believes in the country our founders envisioned. You dont do it by pandering, by telling people what they want to hear. You do it by telling people the truth. I know this because we did it in new jersey. When i first became governor, the establishment said it was impossible to stand up to the Teachers Union to demand they pay their fair share. Those same people said it was impossible for a republican governor to bring a Democratic Legislature to the table to really reform pensions and benefits across the public sector. Conventional wisdom said after decades of raising spending 8 a year in my state, it would be impossible not to raise taxes and to actually reduce spending. Those same believers of the conventional wisdom, talking heads that say this is the way its always been done, said we would never pass tenure reform, where bad teachers could be required could be fired and Great Teachers would get merit pay. We surprise them all. When the same Political Consultants told me there was no way i could be elected governor of new jersey as a prolife republican because it had never been done before, they were wrong. The people of new jersey could see the sincerity of my beliefs on that issue. [cheers and applause] despite what those conventional wisdom hawks may say to you, i can assure you that being prolife is not a political liability anywhere in america. [cheers and applause] being honest with the people you hope to represent about the feelings you hold deeply is never, ever a political liability, whether it is politically popular at the moment or not, and i will never change, doing it exactly that way. I ran in new jersey as a prolife candidate in 2009 and i won. I ran for reelection as a prolife governor in 2013 and won by 22 points. The notion that our party must abandon our belief in the sanctity of life to be competitive in blue states is simply not true, and i am living proof of that fact. [cheers and applause] i do believe that every life is an individual gift from god that no life is disposable. I want to suggest all of you that truly being prolife is not just being prolife when that life is in the womb. Truly being prolife is bring prolife being prolife for the entire period that god gives that life. [cheers and applause] that is why in new jersey, we have said that those who fall victim to the scourge of drug addiction, that those lives are valuable too and whether or not you are a teenager or young adult, drug addicted, lying on the floor of a prison cell, your life is no less precious, and you do not deserve any less a Second Chance at reclaiming your life. We need to make sure every life is treated with the love that god created it with. We need as a Prolife Movement to not just be talking about those first nine months, but about every month that that life exists on the earth that god has given us. We will continue to fight that way. [cheers and applause] for all those people who say voters dont respond to that, they are wrong. I got 61 of the vote for reelection, won 51 of hispanic voters, and 22 of africanamerican voters. 57 of independent voters, and 54 of women. If you read the conventional wisdom they say theres no way that somebody who holds those principles would get those votes. They are wrong when they say it, and we are going to prove them wrong again and again and again by standing up for what we believe in. For two long too long, republicans have tried to squeeze out victories by running strong in red states and try to pick up a few extra votes in ohio and florida. If our conservativism is really going to succeed, it must be able to defend itself in every part of this country. There are americans in every state who share our goals, who want to work with us, and we should be appealing to all of them. If we are going to truly restore and renew this country and its promise, we need a coalition that covers all parts of the country, all ethnicities, a coalition comprised that its core of our proud yet underserved and underrepresented workingclass in this country. The rich are doing fine. Thats great. We dont demonize the wealthy, as so many folks in the Democratic Party do, but nor should we cater to the wealthy at the expense of our middle income workers and the working poor who are the backbone of every american community. [cheers and applause] every domestic policy we advance, every decision we make should be focused on making their lives better, renewing their future, renewing their faith, their belief in this country. When we talk about our values and ideas, people respond. I have seen it all over the country. It is a believe that it is our job and the job of the government to give the people an opportunity to succeed, not stand in their way, a believe that what works best is a government that understands the value of that opportunity, and peoples desire for it over the crippling diminishment of the entitlement state a believe that celebrates the greatness of american ideals and principles not one that constrains americans aspirations. If you have the will and drive to seek a better life, we will help you, not getting your way. We need to renew our country i once again encouraging our citizens to believe that true success is within their power not by the power of the hands of government in washington, d. C. This is what conservatism offers the people our country today and the hope it is always offered the people of our country. These are some of conservatisms most important principles to me, that placing the opportunity the optimism, and the hope that is in the minds and hearts of our fellow citizens must be ahead of the idea that government is it a visor of all good ideas and the provider of all assistance. It is the type of conservative i am and will always be. Thats the type of conservative i believe can again inspire our party and our country. Im sure you will not agree with me or any other candidate on every single issue. If you want a candidate who agrees with you 100 of the time, i will give you one suggestion. Go home and look in the mirror. You are the only person you agree with 100 of the time. [cheers and applause] any of us who are married know for sure that is true. [laughter] more importantly, if that is the standard we hold each other to as a party, we will never win another National Election ever. You will always know who i am. You will always know what i believe, and you will always know where i stand. What we lack in America Today is a National Leader who we feel we truly know. A National Leader who will tell you who he or she is, where they are from, and how they have come to believe the things they believe in. And so, you need to let people know who you are. And so, we will go back to where we started, the direct, blunt new jersey stuff, right . Where did that come from . I have an irish father and sicilian mother. [laughter] at a very young age, i got very good at conflict resolution. My father who is sitting at home today watching this doesnt like this part of when i talk, but i have to say its the truth. My mother was the driver. My father was a passenger. She was a strong tough woman from a single mom who from 11 years old helped to raise her two younger siblings, and who would tell us all the time, chris, be yourself. Then tomorrow you dont have to try to remember who you pretended to be yesterday. [cheers and applause] she used to say to me when she would be giving me her litany of complaints about what i had done or my siblings mom why do i hear about all this now . She said, i need to get it off my chest. There will be no deathbed confessions. Your hearing and now. It now. [laughter] a talk about her in the past tense because i lost my mom little over 10 years ago. She was diagnosed with lung cancer on valentines day of 2004. By the first few days of may that same year, she was near death. I was away on business in california. My younger brother called me and said, you need to get home. Moms not going to last much longer. I took the redeye flight home from california and i went directly to the hospital that morning. I sat next to her, and she was in and out of things. She finally woke up and as my mother would she had not seen me for five days she said, what day is it . I said, its friday. What time is it . 9 30. She said, go to work. [laughter] i was u. S. Attorney at the time. I said, im taking the day off. Im going to spend it with you. Christopher on it is a work day. Oh to work. Go to work. I said, i will make up the time. Dont worry. I want to be with you. She reached over and grabbed my hand and said, christopher, go to work. It is where you belong. And then she looked at me and said theres nothing left unsaid between us. My mother had raised us our whole lives to understand that in a trusting relationship, you need to tell people what you are really feeling and what you really believe, and sometimes it might be uncomfortable, but its better than not saying it. I lost her 48 hours later. It was the last conversation we ever had. So powerful to me that 10 years later, it still defies the way i act in public life. Defines the way i act in public life. Im sure there are moments when shes looking down on me from heaven saying, dont say that rate i do not mean that. But on balance, im sure shes pretty happy that her son is following her lessons. I know that she would believe this, and i know i do. Its not only within our power to make this country great again , but it is our responsibility as americans to do so, given the gifts we have been given by our predeces everybody in this room would not have been here all day if you do not believe in this country believe in hard work what weve got ahead of us to fix this country is going to be hard work, but the reward will be a second american century, a second american century. I want to and with this end with this. One of the great founders of our country, when he was right near the end of his life, wrote for posterity in his diary because he was so concerned that the country he helped to found 50 years earlier was going off on the wrong track. John adams wrote for posterity for us. He said, you shall never know the sacrifices we endured to secure for you your liberty. I pray you will make good use of it. If you do not, i shall repent in heaven, forever having sacrifice at all. The next century does not have to be a chinese century. It can be an american century. We do not need to have a country that stands idly by in the face of russian aggression. We do not need to have a country that stands and watches as middleclass wages go down and our countrys quality of life goes down. We do not need to have a country that looks at an entire class of children and says, you cant learn and we cant teach you and its not our problem. The pursuit of happiness is a goal that we need to work every day to attain. The world cant do without a second american century, and neither can my children or yours do without america being a strong, resolute leader in this world. I will guarantee you this, i will not be willingly a part of a generation that makes john adams repent in heaven for having made the sacrifices that he and our Founding Fathers made for the liberty we enjoy in the freedom we live under today, and im here today because i do not believe that any of the patriots in this room want to be a part of a generation that turns over to our children a lesser smaller america than the one that was given to us. It is time for us to stand up and fight together for the country that we were given, for the country we believe in, for the country the world needs, and for the country i want my children and your childrens to have. If you are willing to fight with me, i will always stand with you and fight with you and tell you the truth. God bless this country, and god bless all of you. [cheers and applause] boy, it just keeps going. Im so proud of the leadership that has emerged here today. We are down to our last leadership speaker on deck. The on deck speaker is governor Mike Huckabee. [cheers and applause] he is the governor we are proudest of from hope, arkansas. [laughter] he served there from 1996 until 2007. One of the things he did was in the 2007 straw poll, Mike Huckabee was the winner because he created the momentum in the straw poll in 2007, and the momentum that carried him through the iowa caucus in 2008 where he posted a victory with 34. 4 . I was out on the campaign trail and interacted with governor huckabee a good number of times in that campaign season. I was on the fair tax bus. We went all over and stopped and did fair tax events. If anybody needs to be reminded, that is where we abolish the irs to take all the tax of the productivity earnings, savings and investment, and you get to decide when you want to pay taxes when you are a consumer for personal purchases. Mike huckabee and i sat down in a hotel on the other side of town and talk through that one day. I was encouraged that he went all over the state, raise the fair tax up, and that helped him ride to a victory in the caucus in 2008. I have come to this place with it. I have concluded myself that the fair tax is everything good. It does them all better. Nobody has done it better in the state of iowa for promoting the fair tax and nobody came into our living room better for those years, the governor Mike Huckabee. Please welcome governor Mike Huckabee. [cheers and applause] thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Considering how long you have been here today, im just glad when you stand up and sit back down. I was really worried about that. I think of the bible scripture that comes to mind for all of you who have been here since early this morning, they that endure to the end shall be saved. [cheers and applause] what a nice thing to be talking to a room full of saints today. Im so grateful that you stayed. I heard me speak and i would not have stayed. Im delighted. Thank you so much. Originally when this was all being set up and i accepted the invitation, i was worried i would have a hard time getting here, so thats why they put me last. When this was set up, i was still doing a Television Show for fox news in new york almond and i was going to tape it and hurry here. Maybe you know, but three weeks ago was my last show on the Fox News Channel. A lot of people are wondering why would he do that . I will leave it to your imagination, but it was not so i could go deer hunting every saturday. Six and a half years working at the Fox News Channel was an extraordinary experience. It was a phenomenal opportunity to work with some of the greatest professionals, and more than just people who are technically good at what they did, but people who had an extra ordinary core. I find it funny when people come up to me and say, what was it like . Tell us what it was really like. I will look around and say, let me tell you what it was really like. It was the best six and a half years of working with some of the greatest people on earth and i will say it in a whisper and say it out loud, im so grateful for the experience. [cheers and applause] one of the reasons i was grateful was for the extraordinary privilege i had of working for one of the greatest minds in america, roger ailes. Roger is the guy who conceived the Fox News Channel and still runs it brilliantly. Theres a couple things about roger ailes you need to know. One, hes the smartest guy in the room and it doesnt matter who else is in the room. Two, he has a wonderful philosophy that has created the atmosphere that you may think you understand, but i can tell you from the inside it is an extraordinary and unique environment in the media world. People really do get along. There is an extra ordinary sense of family. He has a statement that he says, we dont pee inside our own tent. Roger says it little more graphically than that. For those of you who are shocked by what i just said, i assure you, you would have been more so if i told you exactly the way he says it. The point is well taken. You cannot create a Successful Organization of any kind if you spend your time pulling the pin tossing it under the chair of the people in your own tent. One of the things im committed to is that we dont spend the next two years beating each other up in the conservative tent, we need to tell america what is right in this country. If we will talk about whats good in america, we have plenty of things to talk about. But governing america isnt always easy. It has been said that there are two things you should never see. You should never see a law or a sausage made. [laughter] i have seen both. I still eat sausage. I can attest to the fact that neither are very pretty. In the case of a sausage you would get this in a way that no one else in america does. If youre going to have some sausage, youve got to kill some pigs. There are plenty of people in america who want the sauces. They dont want the pigs. We have got to do some pigkilling to get to the sausage. 410 and a half years, i governed in the state that was the bluest state and all of america. More than vermont or maine or massachusetts or california or oregon. 89 out of the 100 house members were democrats, and 31 out of 35 senators were democrats 90 . I did not walk into the capital every day with them saying bravo. Some governors may walk into their chamber and here hosanna. I walked in and heard crucify him. Arkansass new governor, who will be a terrific governor, was inaugurated just a couple of weeks ago. I went back for the inauguration. Now all seven constitutional officers are all republican. There were none when i was there. Except me. [applause] now all six of the congressional delegation, all for congressman, are republican. There is a republican super majority in both the house and the senate now in that state. [applause] i watched him walk down the aisle and he was getting all the accolades from legislators. I turned to somebody and said, the difference is hes shaking hands with people who actually voted for him. [laughter] i think america is coming around with the understanding that the views, values we put forth as republicans, as conservatives are values that they can embrace , and actually make a difference for their families. This past week the president in his state of the Union Address for those of you unable to stay awake as Ruth Bader Ginsburg found [laughter] made a comment that chilled at me from my nearstupor joolted me for my nearstupor. When he said, the greatest threat this nation faces and i waited. And then he said, is climate change. Not to diminish anything about the climate at all but mr. President , i believe most of us would think that a beheading is a far greater threat to an american than a sunburn. I wish he understood that we have a real enemy with just long Islamic Jihadism. Nobody wants war. Nobody whoever wants to be president would want to be a war president if at all possible to avoid it. But im convinced that if we want to avoid war, the best way to do it is to make the enemy afraid to start one. [applause] the best way is to remember that nobody wants to pick a fight if they think you are going to knock them. That is the best way to stop the war. Im not talking about waving guns around people, but when someones life and liberty is threatened, it is time to, in the words that i would say, its time to go numeral [indiscernible] on them. At that point, we dont call 911 out of fear, but rather to call and tell them where to come and pick up the body. [applause] so my friends, we cannot defeat the enemy Islamic Jihad is and, if we dont identify them. Jihadism, if we dont identify them. It is not merely an aberration of geopolitical fault. These are not people who want to be higher in the pecking order in the Great International family. These are people who fundamentally believe that you should never be able to draw another breath, and they are committed to the notion that you wont, and that they will bury you and your children and your grandchildren. The fact is, if our president and this administration cannot identify the clear and present danger, and cannot see the difference between the good and evil in this world, i am convinced it is so unbelievable that they can watch a 1950s western and not be able to tell you who the good guys and the bad guys were. You are going to hear a lot over the next couple of years from the liberals. They are going to tell you that the greatest challenge facing American Workers and families is income inequality. Now folks, sometimes i think the greatest challenge we face economically because we will never be economy when we punish productivity and rewarde a responsibility your responsibility irrespo sibiulity. Dont work too hard or too much we wont hurt you or we will hurt you. With obamacare we have people who run businesses whose goal is not to see how big they can grow it to make sure they can keep it small