Act. And he also took questions from the students. His remarks are an hour. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Ive got three boys. Ive got one of them with me tonight, william paul. If you like obamacare, you can keep it. Apparently that is the republican message. If you like obamacare, you can keep it. Raise your hand if you want to keep obamacare. Exactly. What happened to these people . Were going to repeal it. We decided to vote on a partial repeal. We lost like eight people who voted for it a year ago. Then we started getting skinnier and skinnier. What percentage of obamacare were we going to appeal . Maybe 20 . It amazes me how people with a straight face and one republican alternative plan said literally put forward by republicans, if you like obamacare, you can keep it. I just dont understand the disconnect. People come up here and they get some sort of addiction to power. In fact, i think it was lincoln who said if you want to challenge a man, test a man with adversity, give them power. We with have some people that succumb to it. They forget where they came from. They forget what they said on the campaign trail. Some people said in order to get ahead what we need to do is hold hands and sing kumbaya and everybody just needs to be nicer. Were not nice enough to each other, everybody says. Apparently that may be true. They were shooting at me at the baseball game. So some of them may not play nice. Do we have to all believe the same thing . Can you believe things strongly and still have Public Discourse about it . Was it always this way . People say, you know, how your parents or maybe your grandparents, my parents would say, remember the 1950s, everything was perfect, you know, and nobody was angry and everybody lived as this idyllic Peaceful World and nobody was ever angry with each other. They say in politics, oh, yeah, everybody used to get along. Its incivility that is the problem. Its like this ves people not read any of our history . Thomas jefferson and john adams were at each others throat. They were accusing each other of having children out of wedlock. Andrew jackson, they were talking about him being a bigamist and being married to a woman before she was divorced. Weve had a lot of acrimony. From my state, there was a guy named henry clay. Probably one of the most famous senators over there. When he first came up, though, he was elected to the house. This is like 1810. He gets elected. And he becomes speaker in his first term. Its like many times these people have been up here 20, 30, 40 years. It was kind of a raucous place. There were dogs on the the floor. There were people the dering jer had just been invented as a sliding pistol. You could have one that slid down your arm just in case people got out of hand in the house of representatives on the the floor. There was this guy named John Randolph of roanoke. Had two big dogs. These were not like labradoodles. Think game of thrones, all right . The speaker before henry clay said, we have to get those dogs off there. A guy from north carolina, a congressman came up to John Randolph of roanoke and said, you need to get those drawings o dogs out of here. Proceeded to cane him over the head. So henry clay gets elected. Henry clay says to the sarge ent an of arm, get those damned drawings off the the floor. And so the sergeant of arms was armed. He went over, made him take the drawings out. So John Randolph of roanoke was none too happy with henry clay. John randolph of row won knock buts up and says, i never side step a skunk. Things were not ever completely acrimony. The moral of the story isnt that we should carry guns or be so unhappy were shooting at each other in the house floor. Do we want the opposite. That we have to just sing couple by yeah, not voice what we truly believe in . Are there things that truly are important enough that you should stand your ground on . I think there are. There have been times in our history when we do. If people ask you who is a hero and if i were to define what a hero is, to me, a hero is someone who is not a man or a woman of their times but a man or woman beyond their times. So, for example, in our history, William Lloyd garrison to me is a hero. He opposed slavery when it wasnt popular. Everybody said Andrew Jackson had slaves. Jefferson. Everybody had slaves. So it was accepted. It wasnt a big deal. Well, you can argue that but you could also argue who were the Extraordinary People who said it was a big deal. Who understood even at that time. William lloyd garrison wrote a little newsletter called a liberator for like some 35some odd years. Said lincoln should get all the credit. A great book. Its called forced into glory. I know youre not supposed to say anything bad about lincoln. The whole point was lincoln kind of got there because of people like garrison who fought in the trenches. Who fought for ideas. For so long, lincoln was a politician. Lincoln, you know, writes a letter at one point and says, you know, if he can keep the union together and we must keep slavery, hed settle for that. So, the thing is, lincoln did a great thing in the end. He got there by somebody had ideas and somebody said slaverys wrong. So we need people i think in every time who are trying to think beyond the moment of what the next thing we can do. And there are issues that maybe arent the issues of slavery but there are issues of great importance that we find. The idea of whether, you know, babies mean anything or children mean anything. You know, do we just say no big deal . You know . The question i asked debby wasserm Wasserman Schultz about a year ago is when does life begin. Many of them say when you take the baby home. So if youre babys in the hospital for a couple unof months, its not really alive . In my being pra tpractice, i wo babies that were sometimes a pound, pound and a half. When theyre born really early and they get oxygen too soon, they can develop abnormal blood vessels in their eye and it leads to blindness. Youll see people my age who are blind. One of the most common things is they were born prematurely. One of the common things is we say well, im for the right to not have red light cameras. I hate red light cameras, by the way. The thing is, to get to red light cameras, you got to be for something even more important than that that proceeds that. Individual liberties and rights. We got to understand where our liberty comes from. That our liberty proceeds government. That our liberty comes from our create effort. And the thing is, if we dont understand that, we get confu confused. And then when bernie, uncle bernie comes along and says, well, health cares a right. And its like, well, if its a right, then does that mean you have a right to the involuntary servitude of those who are going to give you the health care . And really, if its a right, if you have a right to concrete items, where does it end . You know . So here we are sitting, debate g ing obamacare. And my side, god help us, my side decides that the only way we can replace it is to have a near lly 300 billion insurance Stabilization Fund. They said, well, insurance is too expensive. What well do is well tax everybody. Put it into a fund. Give it to the Insurance Companies. They they can charge less. I raised my hand which is always a danger at lunch and i said, well, you know, i havent had a new car in a while. New cars are very expensivexpen. If we could have a new car Stabilization Fund, that would help me. Ive got two kids in college. Could we have a college Stabilization Fund . My kids, i dont know about any of you. My kids drop their phone in river, lakes, ponds, you name it. Iphones are expensive. Could we not have an iphone Stabilization Fund . When did it become a republican idea to take from the general populous attacks, stick it into a fund, give it to a private company and tell them to lower their prices . It is not republican. It is not conservative. That became one of the main things. Thats still what theyre talking about. When they say we dont have a replacement. They want a government replacement. So we got into this debate at the very beginning. And, you know, i was on one of the Television Programs and i said yes, we should replace it at the same time because we need to offer something positive to the people. And i would replace it with freedom. Freedom of choice, competition. Legalize the sale of inexpensive insurance. But then everybody started hearing me say that. Then all of a united statsuddene need replace. To many people, replace was keeping much of obamacare in place. Keeping the tax subsidies in place. Padding a new insurance fund. But then keeping the regulations in place. What it gets to is this, you are the next generation. You got to think through things. So, for example, what are the unintended consequences . I tell the people the problem with washington is we have big hearts but small brains. Sort of a dinosaur kind of syndrome up here in more ways than one. But the thing is, people say we must help people. And so we have to let people buy insurance who are already sick. Because if we dont, were just not good people. And then compassion is equated with money. So people just started throwing all kinds of money at every problem. Which isnt republican. And really isnt truly compassionate if you destroy the country in the process. But the whole idea was just throw more money, throw more money at this. And the thing got bigger and bigger and bigger. But the fundamental flaw of obamacare is this. In one sentence. The fundamental flaw is this, if you tell people they can buy insurance after theyre sick, and then you put a bunch of mandates on insurance to make it more expensive so poor people and working class people cant aford it and you tell them you can still buy it after youre sick, guess what happens, they wait to buy it until theyre sick. Fancy name for this is adverse selection. You get sicker and sicker people. And the Young Healthy people dont buy it. And its the death spiral that is obamacare. What did the republicans offer to replace it with . They said, well, we will subsidize the death spiral of obama care. They werent going to fix it. So what is the real problem here . Do you think i dont care about people who are sick . People in my family are sick. Very sick. You know, i care a lot about getting People Health care. I spent a lot of my life trying to help people who dont have insurance to get care. So i do care about people. But i want to do something that works. Its like this. If your house is on fire, do you call your Insurance Agent and say, i really need to get Homeowners Insurance, i forgot to get Homeowners Insurance . No, if your house is on fire, you call a fireman. If you were very sick and have no money, we do have Government Health care. Its called me kaddicaimedicaid. And then you say, were going to take all the sick people and put them together in one place. Were going to call it a highrisk pool. It doesnt work. Its not insurance. The Insurance Companies know exactly what its going to cost. And so when the insurance executives came in, i said, well, if you no longer force people to buy insurance through the mandate, you dont find them, this is called individual mandate, they taxed you if you didnt buy insurance. If you dont do that but you still tell people they can buy insurance after theyre sick, guess what, it might be worse than bmdz carobamacare. We keep what was in obamacare but we get rid of the force. Most of us are conservatives. We dont want force or coercion. But if you keep the regulations in place, that still say you can buy it after youre sick, people do. It just will not work. And so really the problem is and this is true of anything, you could say, for example, that water is so important that how could we leave that up to individuals to figure out how to get water. Food is so important. Cars are so important. How could we possibly let free individuals make arrangements to buy and sell things with their neighbors . How could we possibly do that . We have to have the government involved. Id wipe out all the obamacare regulations tomorrow including on preexisting conditions. Is it that i dont care . No, the marketplace will work. What happens to those who fall through the cracks . Well, you may not have a right to health care, we have an obligation to help you. Theres a difference between that. I think thats important for you. Youll be in these debates in college and stuff. Do you have a right to health care . No. But do you have an only gation to help people who dont have health care . Absolutely. Theres a difference between an only gation and a right. Are you your brothers keeper . In a religious sense, absolutely. But is the government, should big brother be your brothers keeper . No. Why dont i want the federal government to do it . Ill tell you one reason, one, because i think you lose your liberty in the process. Two, theyre just not very good at anything. People will ask me, do you think government is inherently stupid . I say, well, i dont know. But its a debatable question. Look it, they cant even deliver the mail. The post office they havent figured out that we have email is the first problem. But the post office loses 1 billion a quarter. 4 billion a year. So they came to my committee a couple years ago and said, well, to retain good people, to have a good post office, were going to have to pay the executives more. So i raised my hand, which is always a problem. And i said, well, how much talent does it take to lose 1 billion a quarter . You think you got to pay people 2 million to lose 1 billion . Ill work for half a billion. If the standard is losing 1 billion a quarter. When you look at it, there are two reasons why. There are two main categorical reasons why you would want to be for limited government. Why you want small government. Really at every level. Particularly at the federal level. I call it the liberty argument and the efficiency argument. The liberty argument is this. When you work and you get your check, and lets say you made 100. You put plants in or put a roof on or doing something outside, mowing grass. And you got 100. Whose money is it . Your labor. You traded someone. They paid you 100. They said, well, youre arguing for anarchy, no taxes. Lets accept theres going to be some taxes. Were going to have taxes. Were going to have some Law EnforcementNational Defense and several theres probably one or two other things. I cant remember the other ones. Wed have a few things. Wed have a small government that does things. Youd have some taxes. If i told you, you made 100 and the taxes are going to be 90 out of every 100, would you think i took something that was yours . That i stole the fruits of your labor . So the argument is this, not for an exact tax level but for the lowest possible tax level that you can have the amount of government that we have to have to do things that cant be done in the private marketplace. Mostly National Defense. A few other things. Theres very few other things. National defense needs to be done by the government. Even entitlement programs and all that. I do it at the stapte level. And they end up i think destroying people. What is the number one way you get selfesteem . Can someone give you selfesteem . Youre the selfesteem generation. Everybody at schools been trying to give it to you forever. Everybody gets a trophy, right . Everybodys a winner, right . No, you get selfesteem by doing something. And it doesnt mean that everyones a concert pianist. All right. Somebody will be. Not everybodys an opera singer. Not everybodys a doctor or lawyer. But you get your selfesteem by doing things. I think Big Government come unless and actually takes that away from you. Nobody can give it to you. You get it through work. So ill often tell people, ill say, well, yes, we should have work requires for welfare, absolutely. Every able bodied person that gets anything from government ought to work for it. They said, that sounds so harsh. Said, no, works not a punishment. Work is the reward. Work is how you feel better about yourself no matter what it is. Thats where you get your selfesteem, is by doing something, producing something. Weve got to figure some of this out. Weve got to figure out, you know, what we think government should do. The first argument against Big Government is liberty argument. If you give up 90 of your check, youre losing your liberties. You want to give up a small amount. My dad used to always say, well, the church never asked for more than so . He didnt think the federal government should either. Thats not a bad standard. The other arguments the efficiency argument. It kind of goes along with the post office. Theres a great statement by milton freeman. He said nobody spends somebody elses money as wisely as their own. Thats why governments not efficient. That and sort of that there is no profit motive. The profit motive and this is the invisible hand of selfinterest. People say how terrible it is. What if government didnt direct all our economic afairs and people were just selfish and they wanteded more money for their family . The interesting thing about it selfinterest, trying to maximize profit, leads to efficiency. What is capitalism . Capitalism is that supply and demand curve crossing. Whats the result of it crossing and finding the intersection . The most amount of got p good most amount of people at the cheapest cost. You want Central Planning . Go visit venezuela. Go visit cuba. [ cheers and applause ] conservatives are very good with the Second Amendment. That may be their best amendment probably. And im all for the Second Amendment. I am very supportive personally, public, every which way you can think. But the thing is, you have to think of all the bill of rights as a conservative. You want to defend the Second Amendment . You got to really believe in the first amendment. Because without speech, without discourse, without the ability to organize and associate with fellow believers. Youre not going to keep it. You also have to have the