Military retiree benefits vulnerable as Congress struggles to cut debt

Video: Clinton says sharp ideology ‘lousy’ for economy

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   >> to that point, if unemployment does not come down significantly from 9.1%, you know the history, can this president be re-elected?

   >> yes, if people believe that he had a credible plan, and the republicans thwarted it, either because they were wrong or they just wanted to beat him. that's the problem they're facing. and i know there's a story in the press today saying that the house was going to offer to pass about 2.5% of what the president asked for. about 2.5%. if the story in the paper is right. and if that's true, they've put themselves in a perilous position. they are now opposing the payroll tax cuts that they have always been for. they had to figure out why they were against that. they're -- they're against them for wanting to offset the cost of this with raising taxes on upper-income people. if they don't want to do that now, they should say this is an emergency, and we'll just pass the tax cuts right now. it is an emergency. they didn't have any problem at all for 7 1/2 years fighting the wars in iraq and afghanistan off budget and doubling the debt of the country. and all of a sudden now, they can't bear to spend a little money to give the average american a payroll tax cut and the average small business person a payroll tax incentive to hire new people. i think that, you know, we need to clarify the choices here, and settle down. the fundamental problem, david, that's why i like what i'm doing now, in the global initiative, we have republicans and democrats, and conservatives and liberals and people from all over the world. we just try to do what works. and the fundamental problem that we've got in america today, i think, or parts of the economics, is that conflict makes good politics. sharp ideology and all this stuff, that's been very successful politically, but it's lousy for economic policymaking. if you look at the places that are really successful in america today, look at silicon valley , look at the computer simulation boom in orlando, and lots of other examples, in those places, without exception, you have cooperation between a vibrant private sector and a smart government. and cooperation is great for the economy, but it doesn't work as well politically. so we've got this big disconnect between politics and economics, and until we close it we're going to have a hard time coming back.

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