Latest / Q & A, Hosted by Jay Nordlinger / Jeb Bush: Policy, Politics, Life

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Jeb Bush: Policy, Politics, Life · Q & A, Hosted by Jay Nordlinger

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Hello everyone and welcome to Q&A.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Jay Nordlinger and our guest today is a favorite of this program,
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: certainly a favorite of mine, Jeb Bush, who for two terms was governor of Florida.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: He is the founder and chairman of the Foundation for Excellence in Education,
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: otherwise known as Excel in Ed, excelined.org.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Well, hello, Jeb Bush.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: Great to see you.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: Jay, it's great seeing you as well.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: Appreciate it.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: You are interested in policies of all sorts, domestic policy, foreign policy.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: And yet you have this emphasis on education.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: And you yourself went to one of the best high schools in America,
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: a prep school, the Phillips Academy.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yet you have this sort of heart for education in general, public education.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: Can you explain it?
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: Or is it just one of those things and It's what you care about.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes you can't articulate why.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: You just do.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_01: Probably a joyful reading started at my mama's knee when I was a kid.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_01: Interest in education, though,
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: expanded when I was Secretary of Commerce in the late 1980s,
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: believe it or not, in Florida.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: I went to visit all 67 counties.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: And back then,
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: not dissimilar to what it is now,
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: If you ask what's the number one challenge that a big urban area like Miami has or
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: a rural area like Lafayette County,
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_01: they don't call it Lafayette,
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: by the way,
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: it's Lafayette down here,
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: would be making sure that we have a high quality education system.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_01: That's the best way to draw people to our communities.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: And so...
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: And if you look at the results in states like Florida and most of the country,
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: we've had abysmal results of just leaving people behind.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: To this day, too many kids don't gain the power of knowledge.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: And then you can imagine what their lives look like when they're adults
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: and they basically can't read and they can't calculate math.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: They don't have a sense of history.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_01: There's no civics.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: It just seems like people should be marching in the streets for a higher quality education.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_01: And so when I was governor,
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: I had a chance to take this passionate belief and implement changes that move
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_01: the needle, although there's a ton of stuff that needs to be done still.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: I've always been slightly confused about the federal role in education,
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: what it should be.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: I'm of two minds.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: Almost no one liked No Child Left Behind, the act under George W. Bush.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: The left didn't like it.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: The right didn't like it.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: But I always bought the argument, look,
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: if there are going to be federal dollars,
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: if there's federal money in education, attach strings to it.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: See where you're getting for the money.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I suppose some of my libertarian friends whom I respect a lot say
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: that education should be local only.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: There should be no federal role.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: I have a great many opinions, as you know.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: I have a great many loud and sharp opinions on this.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: I just don't know.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: Do you?
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_01: I think it should be states should drive policy.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: It should be implemented locally, of course.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: The federal government should be a partner with the states,
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: but their role should be So,
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: for example,
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: No Child Left Behind was popular for a while,
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: for sure, because it forced states to actually create accountability.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_01: That was its main contribution.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: Florida had already started down the accountability path, so it didn't matter too much to us.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: But there were other parts of the federal programs where they were a partner.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: For example, Reading First, it was called.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_01: This was money that went to states that would create reading programs.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: We used that money and master with state monies to train teachers on how to teach reading.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: Jay, you'd think that all teachers would know how to embrace the science of reading
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_01: and be able to teach, but no.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, most schools of education back then and even today don't train teachers in
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: the elementary grade level to teach kids how to read.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_01: It's like the only thing, the first and only thing that matters K through three.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_01: So they can play a role to accelerate reforms at the state level for sure.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: But I would love to see Title I monies,
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: which are the monies that go to for schools that are predominantly low income,
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_01: where their low income students go.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_01: Why not bundle all that money up?
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_01: There's all sorts of title money, billions of dollars.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: Block grant it back to the states,
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: have some degree of accountability,
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_01: but not a bunch of stupid rules, and be outcome-based, and let states innovate.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_01: California would have a different approach than Florida,
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: and Florida's approach probably, sadly, for California would be a lot better.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: And what would happen...
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_01: Is that the states that fail would see the states that succeed and they kind
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_01: of be forced to adopt some of the reforms that where it's working.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: The best example of that today is Mississippi,
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_01: where in the early like 2011 Governor Bryant called me up and said,
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: I'd like to steal what you did in Florida.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_01: And he did,
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: and he did it really well with the support of now Governor Reeves and
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: the Mississippi legislature.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: They embraced this idea.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: They got philanthropy around it.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: They ended social promotion in third grade.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: They had the best teacher experience.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_01: Training program.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: And Florida went, I mean,
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: Mississippi went from 50th out of 50 on the nation's report card to above
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_01: the national average.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: Today, it's ninth.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: And these are, you know, these are kids that are majority, big majority, are living in poverty.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: They spend half the amount of money that goes to California and New York
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: and other places, but get these results.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: So guess what happens?
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: Other states are now looking at Mississippi and they're saying...
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: We should do what Mississippi does.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: The federal system, when it works, creates these kinds of
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: competitive pressures.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: And we've had fun advocating the best that exists at the local and state level.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: I wish Washington would embrace it as well, but they don't.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_01: They have a hard time giving up power.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's amazing what Mississippi has done.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: And the old joke was that Alabama appreciated Mississippi because Alabama was 49th
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: and Mississippi was 50th.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: And here Mississippi is a An example, a good example.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's just wonderful to see.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, by the way, Alabama is showing tremendous progress.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: So is Louisiana.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: The Carolinas are showing some progress.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: There's this thing called the Southern Surge where states are seeing the success
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_01: in Florida and then certainly in Mississippi and have embraced this.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: And Excel and Ed works with these states to help them develop Be faithful to
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: the process that we know works.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: The big challenge now,
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: by the way,
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: because the mantra at Excel and Ed,
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: and when I was governor,
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: I tried to fulfill this mantra, is success is never final, reforms never complete.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: This is not a check the box thing.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: You have some success and it allows you to create a platform from
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: which you add additional reforms.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what's happening in a lot of places in the country now.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'm more optimistic today because of it.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: Go back to 1976.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: I think you were in college, maybe, and former governor.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: Not quite, because I got out of school quick.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: I got out of college really quick because I was in love with Columba Garnica de Gallo.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I married her when I was – I got out of school in two years because I wanted
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_01: to marry her, which I did.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_01: Wonderful.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I was working.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: Wonderful.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: Well, former Governor Jimmy Carter ran against President Ford and he pledged
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: a federal Department of Education.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: He had the endorsement to the main teachers union.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: And then he won, established a department and Reagan ran an 80 pledging to abolish it.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: He didn't.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so this has been an argument for all of our lives, practically.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: In your view, should there be a Department of Education or does it not matter much?
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't matter.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want to disrespect the people working inside the Department of Education,
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_01: but if you block granted the big programs back to the states,
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_01: which is where it should go, and cap it.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: So, I mean, look, Jay, I mean, We have a big problem.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_01: The biggest problem our country faces right now is the inability to live within our means.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: And it's going to have catastrophic impacts.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm comfortable with block granting the monies back,
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: putting a cap on it,
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_01: and let states take over the responsibility of these programs,
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: because effectively that's what's going on anyway.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: So it's not that...
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: There's probably important things that they can do,
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: but they can do those in other areas of other parts of the government.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_01: But by and large,
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_01: we don't need the Department of Education basically creating a ton of rules
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_01: for states to fulfill.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_01: They're filling out forms for the monies that go down,
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_01: and the implementation is happening at the local level.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I don't see it.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_01: Now, can you create...
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_01: Can a president lead the country by saying that,
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: making sure that kids by the end of third grade are proficient readers,
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: or making sure that more and more children are taking Algebra I in eighth grade,
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: or that high school should be not only focused on college readiness,
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: but also career readiness and military readiness?
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_01: You can create a national...
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: Agenda without having a federal government implementation.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's important because education is certainly a national priority,
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: but it should be driven by the states and implemented locally.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: I have one more question on this subject.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: For a long time,
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_00: people on the right like me made villains out of the teachers unions,
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: the NEA in particular.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I think we were right to do so, but I'm not sure.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: Are the teachers unions a problem or were they ever?
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: What's your view of this?
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_01: I think you were right and still are,
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_01: by the way,
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_01: because the union,
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: just basically public unions, I'm not sure are appropriate altogether.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_01: I can respect.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: I forgot about that argument.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's been a while.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: I can respect a union being formed in the private sector representing the interests
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_01: of workers in a business.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_01: It is increasingly not as relevant as it once was,
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_01: but public unions basically are using their political power to get concessions for
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_01: the economic interests of the adults in the system.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_01: And by the way, teachers' unions are representing Janitors, electricians, bus drivers.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_01: They're representing many other people that are in the school districts.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_01: And their agendas go way beyond education.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_01: If you listen to their national conferences or watch their passing resolutions
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_01: about Gaza and a bunch of other stuff that has nothing to do with teaching.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_01: So the states that That have diminished union power teacher union power are the ones
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_01: that are implementing the best reforms.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: Because they're more child centered.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: The states that are captives of the union because of their political power are
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_01: the are the most resistant to any kind of change to make sure children can learn so.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: I think your instincts are correct.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: I think teachers unions, I mean, look,
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: don't be surprised that they're representing,
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_01: that's their job, to represent the economic interests of the adults in the system.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: Their job isn't to make sure children can read or that they can calculate math.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: So, I mean,
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_01: we should be clear headed about that and confront them
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: when their policies are making it harder for children to learn.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: Well, this morning I was thinking about your name, Jeb,
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: and I suppose some people think it's a nickname for,
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: short for Jebediah or something,
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: but your initials are J-E-B, you are John Ellis Bush.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: Would you remind, I think I once knew, would you remind me who the Ellises were and what?
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, my aunt,
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_01: my dad's sister married a Alexander Ellis, and so that's where the Ellis came from.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: Interesting little sidebar,
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_01: as I understand it,
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: my cousin,
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_01: at my same age,
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: I'm actually 10 days older,
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: John Ellis,
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_01: his mom confided in my dad that they were going to name him John Bush Ellis,
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: and I came in first,
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_01: and my dad stole the name John Ellis Bush,
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: and So his name became John Sheldon Ellis, I think, or something like that.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: So the great thing about the name is it sounds Texan.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_01: It sounds like it's better than John, I think.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_01: And it's pretty unique and easy to remember.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't know
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: why they didn't call me John, but I'm glad they called me Jeb.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I was looking some things up, and on both sides, you're from old, old American families.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: I think the first ancestor was 1647.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: That's pretty early.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: I think your mom was a descendant of, or related somehow to President Franklin Pierce.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: And am I right about that?
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you are.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_01: We're not too proud of, I'm sure he was a fine man, but his...
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_00: He was a fine man, yes.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: We were waiting for Lincoln.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_01: The interesting story about him was he was going to New
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_01: Hampshire to Massachusetts
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: to catch another train down to Washington for his inauguration.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_01: And there was a huge accident and his son was severed in half, I think, or something like that.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_01: It was a devastating accident.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: And his wife never moved to Washington.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I think President Pierce may have taken to drinking.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: Horrific, horrific.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: So he didn't go down in history as a great, great president.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, my mom was related to him.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: So you qualify as a so-called heritage American.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: That's a new term.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: You must hate all that crap.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: You must hate that nativist stuff.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: You yourself married a Mexican immigrant.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_01: You know, there's some clown that's running for railroad commissioner in Texas.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a UT grad, so I was pretty fired up when Texas beat OSU.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_01: If I was in that crowd with the college students that he depicted as somehow alien
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: to shouldn't be there,
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: that they were taking seats away from Other Texans,
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_01: the implication was they're coming from Bangalore or something like that
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: and weren't part of the American experience.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's disgusting.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's mean-spirited and it's hateful and it's wrong.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: And so the pushback, thankfully, is pretty severe for this clown.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_01: And I hope there's a lesson learned that, look, these are high striving.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: It's hard to get in the University of Texas And these are these are,
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: high striving kids that are also as part of the Texas experience
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: and American experiences.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: My children, for sure.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_01: And what the hell, man, they were celebrating an incredible comeback.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: It was a great game.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: Why?
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: Why?
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like, why take a piss on that?
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: This is what this guy tried to do.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's just social media.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_01: It's just horrible for our country.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: But here's what gets my goat.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: He's a politician.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: He has won this nomination, earned this nomination.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_00: He must have calculated before he did this.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the sobering thing to me.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: He thought it wouldn't hurt him, maybe even help him.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's what gets me.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_01: Well, he may think that, but I think he's going to find out that it's going to hurt him.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: Good, good, good, good.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: I got one more thing on ancestry.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's kind of a side note because I have a special interest in golf and always have.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a hack.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a student of golf and I'm devoted to the game and its history.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: And we have the Walker Cup in golf and it's named after George Herbert Walker,
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: who was your great grandfather and the head of the U.S.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: Golf Association.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: And it occurred to me.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: I know your father loved golf, and your brother George W. does.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know about your other two brothers.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: But it occurred to me, I don't think Jeb plays golf.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_00: Am I right?
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: Am I right?
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: I do.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_00: You didn't get the family bug, or did you?
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: I do.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: I did, and I do.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_01: I don't play well, but it's a genetic flaw in the Bush family that we play fast.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so...
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: I can't play a four-hour round of golf unless it's like in some iconic place
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: where you're walking and you're just breathing in the...
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: If you played a four-hour round of golf, that would be fast these days.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: No, I don't.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: I get the first tee time before the
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_01: first tee time.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: So I play here at the Donald Ross course at the Biltmore, which is in my neighborhood.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_01: And...
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_01: Sunday mornings, I can be at Mass at 1030 after having played and maybe a quick breakfast.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: So we play fast and there's a lot of chirping.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: We keep score, but it's never, in my case, never that high, never that low, excuse me.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_01: But I love golf.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_01: I love the camaraderie that comes from it.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm not going to ever be a Walker Cup guy, though.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, fun to watch, but my golf is pretty crappy.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: Who's the best golfer in the history of your family?
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_00: Probably my grandfather.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_01: He was shooting his age in his 70s.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: Prescott Bush?
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, he had a nice swing.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_01: The story goes,
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: as I understand,
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: at the Walker Cup,
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: my great-grandfather was,
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_01: there was a,
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_01: There was a friend of his and kind of a competitor apparently in St.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_01: Louis named Davis.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: And he created the Davis Cup.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: For tennis?
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so this, you know, he was in St. Louis with this guy.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: And so he said, what the heck?
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to do the Walker Cup if you're doing the Davis Cup.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_00: That's wonderful.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: I want to talk a bit about immigration and deportation and all that.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I think ICE is a disgrace.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's a stain on America.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: But this show is not for my opinions so much as for yours.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: How do you see it?
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_01: I think, look,
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_01: I think we have to give President Trump and the administration credit
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: for shutting down the flow of Undocumented, illegal immigrants across the border.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_01: Still to this day,
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know why the Biden administration felt,
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: more than others prior, that it was great politics to allow people to come in.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_01: Unbelievable.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_00: Reckless.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_01: It makes no sense.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_01: And we're still paying a price for that.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_01: So kudos for Doing the work,
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_01: the hard work,
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_01: these Border Patrol agents,
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: I think, deserve a lot of credit and the support, congressional support.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: I totally support that.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_01: But ultimately,
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_01: policies based on cruelty to send the signal that others shouldn't come,
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_01: there's other ways to do that.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_01: And so I find it sad in many ways.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: That the more cruel elements of this are being implemented,
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: especially to send the signal so that people don't think they should come.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: There's a ton of stuff that we could do prior to the Biden policies.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_01: More than half the people that came illegally into the country came
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: with legal visas, tourist visas and extended their stay.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_01: Well, there's ways to deal with that.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_01: There's ways to use technology to continue to support control at the border.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_01: We should make sure that people who have committed serious crimes are deported, for sure.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: But the best way to deal with this, though,
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: is ultimately to create You know,
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: a path to legal status for people that have been here many years and have no nexus
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: to the country that they came from or that their parents came from.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not suggesting a path to citizenship, but residency.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_01: Deal with the people that have come through so-called temporary protective status
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_01: that have been here for 25 years.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_01: I mean...
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_01: Our immigration policy has been a disaster, and it's time to fix it.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: But given the climate today,
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: the left wants full amnesty and wants basically close to open borders.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: And the nativist sentiment that exists in the country has impeded any kind
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_01: of reforms that would allow us to use immigration as a tool for economic growth
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: for all of us.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_01: It's very frustrating.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: So on the one hand,
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_01: I do get credit for the Trump administration because they've done something
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_01: that people didn't think could happen.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_01: And on the other hand,
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_01: where we stand today is we're not reforming the things that could allow us
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_01: to continue to progress as a nation.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_01: And we're making it harder for our country to grow as well.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_01: So
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_01: There's a lot of work to be done.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_01: I don't see it happening in this administration.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe there'll be some common ground found going forward.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_00: You've given me a memory.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_00: Didn't you have a line, something about stapling a green card to their diploma?
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_01: Many people have suggested that, and that makes sense to me.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you have...
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_01: Although we're making,
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: our policies that relates to student visas have narrowed,
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: you know, less than the number of people coming.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_01: And as a result,
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: these high achieving students are either staying in their countries or they're going
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_01: to Canada or going to United Kingdom or other places.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_01: So I don't know.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_01: I'd love to get...
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: The sad part of this is our political system is so divided
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_01: that you can't imagine legal immigration reform.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: American people would want it.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: If you look at the polling,
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_01: most people are kind of commonsensical about this,
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_01: but the people in the political system
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: are either hardcore left or hardcore right.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_01: I think we're missing an opportunity.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_01: This is the country that You know,
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: where our national identity should be based on a shared identity.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's not based on race or some historical fact.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_01: It's not blood or race for sure.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's based on a belief that, you know, people have a chance to rise up here.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: And we've kind of lost that identity of what it is to be an American, right?
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_01: And as such, you know, and we're allowing people to come and not embrace it.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_01: You know, there are pockets of- That's a problem
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: also, yes.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_01: It's a big problem.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_01: But if we got back to our roots where immigration is a catalyst
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_01: for economic growth and- Revitalization.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: Innovation and revitalization where,
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: you know, people embrace the set of American values that have created our greatness.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: I- There's nothing could stop us.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_01: This should be the greatest time to be alive in our country.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_01: And that's part of it, not the only part, but that's certainly part of it.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_00: You mentioned a while ago or alluded to our fiscal house in its very bad shape,
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_00: and we've hit $40 trillion in debt.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: It seems to me that There's no constituency or not a large enough constituency
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_00: for fiscal responsibility.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: Our two major parties seem to be both big government parties and big spending parties.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: So it's hard to see where relief comes, where a sobering up comes.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_00: What do you say?
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_01: I agree with you, Jay.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_01: I'd love to think that the Republican Party...
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_01: I'll use Florida as an example because I know it well.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks to Governors Scott and DeSantis,
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: 16 years, we haven't borrowed, we've borrowed very little.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_01: The debt in Florida...
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_01: Has dropped by 60 or 70 percent.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: Debt service is like below 2 percent.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_01: We have reserves.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_01: We balance our budgets and we have reserves equal to 25 percent of general revenue.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_01: And yet if you come here, you know, the roads look good.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_01: The waters, you know, we protect our natural systems pretty good.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_01: The state is not perfect, but it's doing quite well.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a state where the per capita spending at the state level is the lowest
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: of any state government workers and the spending is quite low.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that kind of approach doesn't exist amongst national Republicans.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_01: The Washington Republicans,
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_01: you know, they can say it's different, but the spending levels are just outrageous.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_01: And we're going to pay a price,
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_01: maybe not People at my age,
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_01: but my children and grandchildren are going to pay a heavy price.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's either going to be through the monetization of the debt or some kind
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_01: of economic crisis where there's going to be massive disruption.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_01: We haven't had a downturn yet since the Great Recession.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_01: Imagine a downturn with debt service today with a growing economy greater than
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_01: the national defense budget.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: It'll grow exponentially.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_01: It's already growing at a far faster rate than national income.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: And so all that money that's going to serve as debt is not going to be spent on defense.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's not going to be spent on taking care of people.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: And it's outrageous that my generation particularly is the one that has created this mess.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: And then we're going to leave this gigantic turd in the punch bowl.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: That's basically what we're doing.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: And we're going to say, see you later.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_01: But you're right.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_01: There's no constituency that I'm aware of to restore fiscal order.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_00: Let's spend a little time on foreign affairs.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I know you have a great interest in Iran.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_00: There's a group called United Against Nuclear Iran that you're part of.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_00: And what do you think of this current Iran war?
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_00: Which I do, there's a debate about whether we should call it a war.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: Seems to me it is one.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's a budget term,
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_01: I think, the reason, I don't quite understand it, but that's a DC thing.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_01: I believe,
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: let me say that the efforts last year and earlier this year,
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: I think were appropriate.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_01: The JCPOA was a failure.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_01: President Trump was correct to get out of it.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_01: The The aspirations of the mullahs and the Revolutionary Guard haven't changed.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: They want to be a nuclear power.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_01: And the idea of deterring that in a dramatic fashion was more than appropriate.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_01: Kudos for the American military for executing that.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_01: I think we have done...
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_01: Work for mankind to not allow Iran to get a nuclear weapon,
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_01: or at least it's been set back pretty dramatically.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_01: We don't have the exact number of years,
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_01: but I think the bombings in last year and certainly the initial stages of this year,
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_01: the effort has been positive.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: You don't get much coverage of that, but,
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_01: and they're The work that Israel has done in the United States
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_01: to diminish their surrogates and now the embargo on Iran,
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_01: all of that is positive because I think eventually it's chaotic right now,
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: but eventually it's going to create a more stable world by limiting Iranian power.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_01: We've learned some lessons along the way that hopefully
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_01: about how we conduct military operations.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_01: And it just brings out the need to make sure that we have
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_01: a much more stable supply chain,
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_01: that our industrial base is quicker to provide the weapons necessary
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_01: to keep us safe.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_01: All that stuff is work in progress.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: And hopefully, in a bipartisan fashion, we'll learn how to improve it.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_01: But I supported the effort.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not sure that That's the majority view in the United States right now.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_01: But if you start with the premise that Iran is evil,
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_01: that the leaders,
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_01: not the people,
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_01: but the leadership,
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_01: both the military and religious leadership of Iran that has suppressed
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_01: the aspirations of the Iranian people and wreaked havoc throughout the Middle East,
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_01: that they're not part of the community of nations,
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_01: then what we did, I think, was appropriate.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_01: And no one else could do it.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_01: But for us who?
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_01: Had we not done it,
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_01: I think Iran today would be a greater threat in the Middle East and certainly
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_01: a threat to ourselves.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_00: Do you think the United States ought to back Ukraine, help Ukraine repel this invasion?
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_01: I do.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_01: I do.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_01: So do I. I think had we done it,
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_01: The Biden administration rhetorically was supportive,
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_01: but every step along the way, we were always a day late and a dollar short.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_01: We could have been much more supportive early enough to have made a major impact on
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_01: the aggression.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_01: But we were constantly concerned about what would happen if we Well,
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_01: on the subject of Venezuela, I
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: I like the removal of Maduro.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure about the semi-partnership with the regime now or what we're doing with the oil.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: What's your view of the Venezuelan situation?
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm hopeful that there is an effort to transition the country to democracy where
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_01: the Venezuelan people Would have a say in what the future
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_01: of their country looks like.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_01: And if they did, Maria Corina Machado would likely be the president of Venezuela.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that would be a phenomenal outcome.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm hopeful still that that's the policy,
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_01: maybe not express, but that's the policy of the United States.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_01: I'm pretty certain that's the belief of Secretary Rubio.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm hopeful that that's the eventual outcome,
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_01: that it would happen in the next months rather than years.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_01: But it's hard to tell.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_01: If it's to sustain a regime that is corrupt beyond belief and does not have
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_01: the support of its people and have used elections to Basically create
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_01: a socialist
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_01: regime suppressing the hopes and dreams of the people of Venezuela.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_01: If we're helping sustain that, then I think that would be completely inappropriate.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_01: But to transition,
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_01: you know, you still know whether there is a path, you know, a plan for transition.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_01: I'm trying to be supportive here.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I hope I'm My hope is correct that there is a plan for the process of democracy.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_01: As it relates to the oil,
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think the Defense Department should be taking ownership interest
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_01: in oil fields.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_01: I'm an old school conservative.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_01: I just don't believe the role of government is to own anything.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_01: I don't like it.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's great that we're focused on fortifying our supply chain
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_01: in these critical areas for our economy and for our military.
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_01: Kudos again to the Trump administration for doing that.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think it's appropriate for the government to be taking ownership positions
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_01: in domestic companies and certainly not Venezuelan companies.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_01: It could be done Where we provide security to allow for private capital to come in
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_01: and we can benefit from that.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_01: But just the Department of Defense owning a company that is also has
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_01: a checkered past, by the way, to own the oil of Venezuela.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_01: Mark me down as a negative on that one.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_00: I take it that you have a basic and Bushian belief in U.S. leadership in the world.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_00: Good for the world and good for us?
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I do.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_00: Of course, we go case by case, don't we?
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_01: I do.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's correct.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_01: I do think it's okay, though, to advance your economic interests along with that.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_01: In fact,
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_01: that should be,
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_01: you know, our national security protecting the homeland should be number one.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_01: Our economic interest in a very competitive world should be number two,
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_01: but also we should be the beacon of hope and aspirations for people that live
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_01: in countries where their dreams are limited because of a repressive regime.
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think we should always be cozying up to countries
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_01: whose leaders are suppressing the aspirations of their people.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_00: Jeb, I often say that, just speaking personally, that Memory Lane is my least favorite street.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: So just a minute of Memory Lane in 2016.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_00: Do you think there's anything you could have done or anyone else could have done
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_00: to stop the Trumpian wave?
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_00: Or was it unstoppable?
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_01: Great question.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_01: It was helpful that there were 16 candidates,
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_01: I think,
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_01: running that were more traditional,
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_01: different views,
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_01: different styles,
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_01: but traditional candidates and one that was unorthodox and very different.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_01: President Trump...
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_01: And to this day, I think continues to have a really unique insight into
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_01: people.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_01: And he doesn't get the credit for it.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_01: Perhaps honed by reality TV, but he knows how to create a narrative.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_01: He knows how to, certainly knows how to garner attention.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know,
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_01: our culture has changed and As a result,
• 38:23
  SPEAKER_01: a guy like President Trump, who has these gifts, emerged.
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't know if anybody else could replicate that, to be honest with you.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know when other people try to be Trumpian,
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_01: if you will, in terms of their presentation and personality.
• 38:40
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't seem to work.
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_01: So maybe he was unique for the time and to this day continues to be unique.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_01: I ran because I wanted to serve and I had ideas about how to fix some things
• 39:00
  SPEAKER_01: that continue to be broken.
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_01: And some of the things that on regulatory reform and other things,
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_01: the Trump administration,
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_01: in my mind, again, has done a lot of incredibly important work.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_01: But the cultural change is what's different and why he, I think, has...
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_01: Garnered appeal in 2016 and continues to hold sway for,
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_01: you know, for a whole lot of people in this country.
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_01: Feel like they're getting screwed and he's the guy that understands their anxiety and, you know.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_00: Of course, some people regard him as the screwer.
• 39:42
  SPEAKER_00: Depends on where you stand.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you know what?
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_01: I pray every day and I pray.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_01: I pray for my president and I hope and pray that he does the right things for our country.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_01: And I still think we're the greatest country on the face of the earth.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm not I don't obsess about our president.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't assess about the previous one or the one prior or even my brother.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I just don't think that's the appropriate way of living your life.
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I do pray for him and I pray for all of our leaders and I hope that they
• 40:21
  SPEAKER_01: And I pray that they do the right thing as much as they can.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_01: Call me corny or old fashioned in that regard.
• 40:32
  SPEAKER_00: I endorse it.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_00: I know that a politician has to have some fairly thick skin.
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_00: When you hear criticisms of your dad and of your presidential brother,
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_00: does it bother you or does it bounce off?
• 40:51
  SPEAKER_01: I play like it bounces off.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_01: It bothers me, you know?
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, of course.
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_01: What I love about my brother is his humility.
• 41:08
  SPEAKER_01: So like his library, basically you go into his library and there will be...
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_01: An exhibit on the Iraq war or other decisions, other issues where he had to make a decision.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_01: And he allows the person to kind of be in the shoes of the president and make
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_01: the decision themselves to give them a sense of these are tough choices
• 41:33
  SPEAKER_01: that you make in these in these positions.
• 41:37
  SPEAKER_01: And sometimes you get it wrong.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes you get it right.
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_01: But you have to have the humility to recognize that and you adjust as you go forward.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_01: I think that I admire that in leaders.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_01: And certainly my brother particularly, you know, was dealt an incredibly challenging hand.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_01: And I think he did it.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: He dealt with it in a way that I'm really proud of him to do.
• 42:06
  SPEAKER_01: And he kept our country safe.
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_01: We're celebrating the 25th anniversary of the attacks that happened last week.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm glad he was president at the time.
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_01: And that will be one of the legacies that I think he'll be quite proud of.
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I looked this up the other day with that anniversary.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_00: I always thought that one of the best comments ever made about a book was made by Bill Clinton.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_00: Because when George W.
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_00: published his book,
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_00: Decision Points, Clinton said, let's the reader know what it's like to be president.
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_00: I thought it was a very interesting comment.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_00: You're the guy at the desk, and the desk is where the buck stops.
• 42:52
  SPEAKER_00: What do you do?
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_00: People can give all sorts of advice, but only you can decide.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_00: And that's an important thing.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, most politicians,
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_01: when they write about what they did,
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_01: they're writing it to defend what they did and maybe exaggerate a bit
• 43:09
  SPEAKER_01: of how they did it.
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_01: They're trying to Make an imprint on history.
• 43:16
  SPEAKER_01: That book basically is a book about,
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_01: as you said,
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_01: it's a book about,
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 43:22
  SPEAKER_01: I want you to get in my shoes and I want you to do,
• 43:25
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_01: see what the conditions were when I made these decisions and you be the judge of
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_01: whether it was the right decision.
• 43:33
  SPEAKER_01: These were the options.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_01: Which is like,
• 43:37
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know of any other You know, autobiography that kind of took that approach.
• 43:43
  SPEAKER_01: It is a sign of a guy comfortable in his own skin.
• 43:48
  SPEAKER_00: Your dad, almost uniquely, I'm trying to think of an exception, declined to write a memoir.
• 43:55
  SPEAKER_00: He co-authored something with Scowcroft, I think, but he didn't write a proper autobiography.
• 44:02
  SPEAKER_01: No, he didn't.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_01: Remember,
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_00: he had this line,
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_00: he said, he was talking about, he said, no one's going to put me on the couch.
• 44:11
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you know, Meacham comes close.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's really more of a biography for sure, but he was given a lot of access.
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a fair book.
• 44:27
  SPEAKER_01: It was a good book.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_01: He wrote,
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_01: the best book of all the books written by my My brother or father was the book
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_01: of letters that he wrote.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_01: All the best.
• 44:42
  SPEAKER_01: It really just...
• 44:43
  SPEAKER_00: Letters that your dad wrote.
• 44:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_00: Didn't you have a pen pal, some kid in the Philippines or something after his presidency?
• 44:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he broke...
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_01: I think it goes even prior to that.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_01: He, you know, responded to one of the charities that were...
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_01: He connected.
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_01: Instead of just sending it to an unnamed person,
• 45:06
  SPEAKER_01: he actually wrote whatever the check amount was.
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was $1,000.
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_01: It was a sizable amount.
• 45:14
  SPEAKER_01: And then maintained a relationship with this kid that no one knew about.
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_01: Until after he passed away.
• 45:21
  SPEAKER_01: And the story then was told.
• 45:23
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was a...
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_01: A young man in Thailand or Indonesia or something.
• 45:28
  SPEAKER_01: My dad was really a special person,
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_01: just in terms of his courage, but also his incredible compassion for people.
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_01: I think about him every day.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_01: Jay, when I was, as I said, I got married when I was 21.
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_01: I was blowing and going,
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_01: doing everything I could to Begin to build my family and provide for it.
• 45:56
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, my dad was like near perfect in my eyes.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_01: And I decided being kind of goal oriented that I wasn't going to try to be as good as him.
• 46:07
  SPEAKER_01: We're going to measure myself against him because I would probably end up being,
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_01: you know, in the fetal position, sucking my thumb in the corner.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_01: It would be impossible for me to to be as good as him.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_01: So I said, OK, half is good.
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_01: I'm just going to constantly be reminding myself that my dad was
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_01: the best you could possibly be as a human being.
• 46:32
  SPEAKER_01: And if I could achieve half of what he achieved in his life
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_01: and how he treated people, that that would be considered a worthy life.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_01: And it's kept me off the couch.
• 46:43
  SPEAKER_01: I don't need therapy.
• 46:45
  SPEAKER_01: I'm really comfortable with who I am.
• 46:47
  SPEAKER_01: But he's been my guiding light in my life.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_01: To this day, I just, I can't, it's hard to describe.
• 46:55
  SPEAKER_01: Just an extraordinary person.
• 46:58
  SPEAKER_00: Will you ever write memoirs?
• 47:00
  SPEAKER_01: You know, no.
• 47:02
  SPEAKER_01: No, I've written, I've
• 47:05
  SPEAKER_01: written a book about my, called Reply All, about all the emails.
• 47:10
  SPEAKER_01: I was, The running joke is when Al Gore invented the internet,
• 47:14
  SPEAKER_01: I got one of the first email addresses and I gave it out consistently
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_01: when I was governor.
• 47:20
  SPEAKER_01: So I stayed connected with people as governor and I tell the stories of
• 47:25
  SPEAKER_01: the incoming, of the stuff that people let me have in all sorts of ways.
• 47:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I was going to write a book about the eight hurricanes and four tropical storms
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_01: in 16 months because it was an extraordinary experience that The state went through.
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_01: But I have no interest in writing a memoir.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm still living my life.
• 47:48
  SPEAKER_01: I don't feel like I've got a business.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_01: I have Excel and Ed is working in 40 states.
• 47:57
  SPEAKER_01: We have 73 people.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's an incredible group of really talented people.
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_01: I'd rather live my life and try to contribute as best I can in my business
• 48:10
  SPEAKER_01: and education reform rather than ponder about what happened in the past.
• 48:17
  SPEAKER_00: Well, before we say goodbye,
• 48:18
  SPEAKER_00: Jeb Bush,
• 48:19
  SPEAKER_00: and it's always a pleasure to talk to you, is there anything else you'd like to say?
• 48:23
  SPEAKER_00: Anything on your mind?
• 48:27
  SPEAKER_00: Anything brewing?
• 48:30
  SPEAKER_01: In my mind, I'll tell you, I think...
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_01: I think we should make sure that children don't access social media until they're 16
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_01: and that adults should stop obsessing about social media altogether.
• 48:41
  SPEAKER_01: I think we ought to figure out ways to get to yes in life rather than ways
• 48:50
  SPEAKER_01: to demonize people that disagree with you.
• 48:53
  SPEAKER_01: I try to explain to people I have deeply held political conservative views.
• 48:57
  SPEAKER_01: I believe in limited government and entrepreneurial capitalism.
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_01: And a strong moral foundation for our country.
• 49:05
  SPEAKER_01: But people that disagree with me,
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think they're the enemy, I just think they might be wrong.
• 49:09
  SPEAKER_01: And it's my job to try to persuade them that maybe they should consider these things
• 49:14
  SPEAKER_01: as they develop their opinions.
• 49:16
  SPEAKER_01: Now, you know,
• 49:17
  SPEAKER_01: because of social media,
• 49:18
  SPEAKER_01: it's exacerbated by social media,
• 49:21
  SPEAKER_01: the people that disagree with you are in a different tribe.
• 49:24
  SPEAKER_01: And you ascribe really bad motives.
• 49:28
  SPEAKER_01: We have to get beyond that quick.
• 49:30
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, this is a perilous time.
• 49:32
  SPEAKER_01: It's full of opportunities, but it's also got massive downside for our country.
• 49:37
  SPEAKER_01: And the one place where I think we could make a big difference is limiting
• 49:43
  SPEAKER_01: the importance of social media in our lives.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's my rant, and I'm sticking with it.
• 49:49
  SPEAKER_00: As I think they said on the Three Stooges, I resemble that remark.
• 49:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm with you.
• 49:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm with you.
• 49:58
  SPEAKER_00: Jeb Bush, I'm glad you're in the arena in whatever fashion, and I hope you always will be.
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_01: Great talking to you, Jay.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_01: Hit him straight, brother.
• 50:08
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks, man.
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_00: Appreciate it.
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_00: You too.
• 50:11
  SPEAKER_00: So long, everyone.
• 50:12
  SPEAKER_00: Till next time.