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iraq. martha: why do you think he didn't do that. >> it would require that he would have to go back and say he was wrong in iraq, that the strategy that he advocated was not correct. he wanted a total pull out of iraq when things weren't going well for the u.s. there, and said that we couldn't win. he didn't think that the surge would work. all those things have worked. radical security gains were made and the iraqis were able to take over and i think that's what you're seeing now is iraq telling us that they in fact are politely asking us to leave but not granting immunity to u.s. troops. they are ready to stand on their own. martha: it's an interesting point. you say that you are in opposition really to a lot of military commander's who say they want to see a secure force left on the ground in iraq, much as we have in south korea and japan for many, many years. and their fear is iran is going to go in and take advantage of that evacuate aoufplt you don't fear that? >> i don't fear that, mart that.
passed into law, right? got to get through the legislature and unions too. >> absolutely. bill: $500 billion is budget gap for retirement funds in california the they're trying to do it in ohio. we'll find out in a week or not whether it survives referendum. part of the issue in california with a nurse making $270,000 a year. >> there are a lot of things. there is 12-point plan that governor brown wants to propose or wants to be made into law. one of them what is called pension spiking. what happens is late in their, when a pension recipient is about to retire they back load all their days off that they didn't take, all the sick days and put it into the last few months of their, before their retirement and and, or, take it in the form of pay. they will spike their pay right before they retire. if they're coming into their pension with 60% of their full pay, they're actually going 60% of a much higher number, almost making more than they were making during most of their years of service to the state. so, it is going to address
ambivalent on issue. just got clobbered in the conservative commentary, conservative blogs beating up on him all day and come back and completely back tracks. the problem with romney that feeds continuing narrative of him as a flip-flopper. he tried to remain neutral on this next day he came out and fully in support of it. it was a bad day for romney. martha: that is why people were clamoring for chris christie. when it comes to the union issue this is something a lot of folks on the conservative side want to hear somebody really definitive on, right? >> absolutely. governor scott walker in wisconsin has been a hero among conservatives the way he stood up to unions there. john kasich done something similar in ohio. here romney is coming in being very wishy-washy about it only next day coming out after getting clobbered. coming out and supporting it. it does not help romney's image with conservatives. martha: byron thank you. >> thank you, martha. bill: he might be running
people and doing one-on-one voter contact. martha: i iowa is big question. i don't think anyone knows who will win eye awe. they're looking at each other in their meetings saying get you on the ground in iowa and talking to people and get rid of this herman cain person. >> the problem if he says he will not do the debates he will be hit merslessly for chickening out. it will look bad. martha: yeah. >> i will say perry has a point in a sense there awful lot of debates coming up, perhaps a dozen, 18, remember some of the debates were planned when we thought the iowa caucuses would be on february 6th. now they will be on january 3rd. a lot less time. more debates and less time to have them. martha: "saturday night live", welcome to the 7th or possibly 8th republican national debate. that was pretty funny. talk about mitt romney. he had back and forth on issue in ohio. this is fascinating issue for him and how tough he will be on the unions.
second in the national polling but mitt romney is leading in strategic places. like first four states on the republican calendar. romney beating herman cain in iowa three points. contest is in early january. blowout in new hampshire. they favor the governor of nearby massachusetts by 27 points. south carolina, romney holding a slim lead over herman cain, 25, 23 there. florida, mitt romney commanding 12-point lead over rest of the field. that's what we see today, martha. martha: we want to point to the herman cain's web video showing his campaign chief of staff reflecting on the campaign puffing on cigarette. a lot of people thought this was very odd. democratic strategist james carville out there slamming this ad. saying block was drunk or stone in his opinion. cain defended ad on "hannity" the other night. ear is what he said. >> many of us found it hilarious. we know mark block.
to blame other people and paul ryan is absolutely right, he has to rely on the politics of division rather than the politics of unity that he ran on in 2008 and -- 2008 and the idea that you can fund the government we have based on the top 1 percent is ularly dishonest as paul ryan pointed out in his speech, you could confiscate all the wealth of people making more than $250,000 a year and you're funding the government for six months, so eventually the tax burden -- >> it has to fall -- it will fall on the middle. that's what president obama is not telling people. that's why he's dishonest. martha: hold on. i have a question for you christopher han with regard to that. i thought this was a really interesting point. you talk about paul ryan's plan and one of the things in it was to do means testing for social security and for medicare, because the notion is we all know that there's a lot of people out there who don't need these checks and they fall into that percentage, so it's very interesting that democrats were so against paul ryan's plan which
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and he went from eighth in the race to second in the race, and he would have beaten bill clinton had he not done some other stuff. the democrats love the flat tax, too, and republicans adore it. bill: you wonder whether or not washington has it in them to change if indeed they're convinced of it. >> they do. bill: the flat tax, 20 percent or less s. a few bullet points, it would eliminate a lot of deduction, credits, exemptions, it would also eliminate the death tax, capital gains tax, and tax on dividends, and that's where you would argue that supply side would invigorate the economy again, and that's what brings us to our story of the day. if you look right now on the our fox polling, herman cain has now gone to number one and should would argue he's a frontrunner at 24 percent, four points ahead of mitt romney. why is that happening art? >> because he came out with a flat tax first. he came out with a credible, really good flat tax and that has just caught the
steadily rising. there's the peak, 659,000 weekly claims there, then you see where it comes down and here we are today, 402,000. but the yellow line represents where you want to be for a healthy economy. so it looks as if this trend seems to be going in the right direction. decent news today. we'll see how the markets open. stuart says they're going higher, he says we're all going to have smiles on our faces today. mr. hemmer. bill: when varney talks like that, save the paper! new scrutiny on a department of energy loan intended for a company headed by a billionaire out of russia, a house committee wants to know where $70 million in taxpayer money was committed to a project that would benefit a russian steel company working out of michigan. got that? darrell issa is our guest in 30 minutes so stay tuned for more on that. also questions about fast & furious and what's happening. there is a very heated hearing on the hill yesterday. we'll see whether or not she got any answers. martha: that does seem like a lot of stories.
i think actually the opposite is true, that u.s. forces remaining in iraq actually embolden iran and empowers them. they've been able to attack our forces there with almost total eupl immunity in a tee through shiite militia groups which are in fact iranian proximate sees. a lot of u.s. servicemen have died through training and iranian weapons. the reality is we have the most expeditionary reforce in the world. we have thousands of troops anywhere in the world with our ships and aircraft in a very short period of time. proximity doesn't necessarily equal security. i think a small tkpwar a son of u.s. forces there rile is not doing much to deter iran. martha: you did three tours in iraq and you have served our country and we thank you so much for your service to our country as a former navy seal and it's great to get your insights on all of this. leif babin we thank you. it's good to have you here as well. bill: greensboro north carolina