On October 13 US Senate candidates John Thune and Jay Williams faced off in a one-hour forum on SDPB as part of their SDPB’s On Focus program. I have embedded the video below for anyone to watch, or it can also be viewed on the SDPB website. In this post I will look briefly at the answers from both candidates on the questions. Some questions I may also add my thoughts. At the end I will offer my thoughts as to who “won” the debate. The forum was moderated by Stephanie Rissler.
I should note this is a very long post. This post is basically a dump of my notes from the forum transformed into a blog post. That makes it easy for me to research these guys in the future.
State of Politics in South Dakota
Rissler mentioned that many of the South Dakota ballot questions may exist because Americans don’t trust government and politicians anymore. She asked if that situation can be changed and how the candidates can help to change that.
Thune
Thune tackled the question by focusing on how much does happen behind the scenes in Congress. Thune talked at length about transportation bills he had worked on and subsequently passed into law. This is a big issue for Thune since he is the Chair of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation.
Williams
Williams says the “state of politics is dismal”. He focused on the fact he is not a politician and he feels the frustration. Williams noted people are unhappy with Congress and want change, but keep voting for the incumbents that represent them.
My Thoughts
I personally agree Congress and most politicians can’t be trusted. But I wish there was a third point of view added to this question. I think people are wrong when saying nothing gets done in Congress. Yes there are fewer bills being passed. But as is the way in DC, there is more pork placed into bills that have nothing at all to do with that bill. It’s a great racket they’ve come up with in DC. They make it look like there is nothing but gridlock, and work behind the scenes to get pork added to various bills. It’s a bipartisan approach to make it look like each side needs more help fighting the gridlock issues.
Presidential Candidates
Rissler asked if the President is still looked at to be a role model.
Thune
Thune is not happy with either of the Presidential candidates and thinks they are both “deeply flawed”. Thune reiterated his public stance that he would like Donald Trump to step down and let Mike Pence have the Presidential spot for the Republicans. Also, Thune believes it is important to defeat Hillary Clinton so there isn’t another four years repeating the last eight years. But since Trump is the Republican nominee against Clinton, Thune noted he would work with whoever is elected. Thune also noted the US has the worse economic recovery since the end of World War II.
Williams
Williams says only one candidate is seriously flawed, and he says that is Donald Trump. He noted George HW Bush is going to vote for Hillary. He went on to call Trump a “sexual predator” and “dangerous for our country”. Clinton, Williams says, comes from “modest” means and has been a great role-model. Williams also took this chance to note that Thune has been obstructionist and has been working to keep Supreme Court nominations from advancing. Williams also says Obama has actually done a good job turning the economy around.
Finally, he noted Thune ran against Tom Daschle all those years ago because of Daschle’s obstructionism. Williams now says Thune is the being obstructionist. In particular that obstructionism from Daschle had to do with Court appointments.
Thune
Thune got a rebuttal about the obstructionism. He says he has stood up to Bush and Obama in South Dakota’s interests. Thune also noted Clinton has repeatedly lied about whether emails were sent or received on her email account and deleted emails after being told not to do so.
Williams
Williams also got a rebuttal to say Clinton has been a role model for all women. He calls the email controversy “made up by the Republicans”. His reasoning for that is because there are “two sides to every email”. Williams also noted Wikileaks is releasing another batch of emails, many of which are probably those emails deleted by Hillary.
My Thoughts
I am only going to talk about Williams’ answer. For as much as Democrats love to bash the Bush family, I find it odd that a former Bush President supporting Hillary would show that she is good.
But the bigger issue to me here is Williams, and to a larger extent all partisan lock-step Democrats, taking a stance against open government by acting like the private email server from Secretary of State Clinton was no big deal. It is a big deal for those of us that truly care about open government. There should be no reason an appointed public employee to a position as powerful as the US Secretary of State should have the email used for official government business on a private server. The main reason I could think of for someone to do so is because of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). During the Obama administration denial of FOIA requests have skyrocketed. As if that weren’t bad enough there was an appointed Secretary of State who had their email on a private email server, which also makes it fall outside of FOIA requests. I really think even Clinton supporters should be holding her accountable for her lack of transparency. No, let me rephrase that: I think that especially Clinton supporters should be holding her accountable for he lack of transparency. I can understand Williams supporting his party’s candidate, but his apparent disregard for open government is really disappointing. People can support their chosen candidate and still rally against certain things that chosen candidate does.
Immigration
Rissler asked a question about immigration, the borders, and how to deal with those in the country.
Williams
Williams noted illegal immigration has gone down since Obama took office. Further he says illegal immigration from our south border is almost nonexistent. He contends the bigger problem is people who are illegal by other means, such as they overstayed their visa. Williams believes we must find a way to have these people participate in the country and be able to enjoy what the US provides. He also says the US should be bringing in refugees, which Republicans used to do.
Thune
Thune says the key to fixing immigration is to enforce the current laws. He would like to secure the borders and provide for bio-metric exit/entry system to keep a tab on those here on visas. He says if that part isn’t fixed the current population of illegal immigrants can’t be dealt with.
National Debt
A question about whether the national debt can be fixed.
Thune
Thune would like the federal government to have a balanced budget amendment, just as South Dakota does. But since that isn’t happening he believes spending has to be cut. He notes 2/3 of federal spending is on auto-pilot, and doesn’t get voted on. Thune then says a bigger fix to the debt is to grow the economy.
Thune also says the heavy hand of regulation and heavy hand of taxes are holding back the economy. It is here that Thune brought up Williams wants to “raising every kind of tax”. Thune says Williams wants to raise payroll taxes, implement a state income tax, increase gas tax up to a dollar per gallon, and a supports carbon tax. Thune states taxes kill economic growth.
Williams
Williams says “our debt is not the problem you think it is” because the interest rates are at zero. He says the deficit causes the debt. There has been some reduction of the deficit during the Obama administration caused by spending reductions. But he goes on to say there needs to be revenue enhancements. Williams did say “yes, we do need to pay some more taxes”. But he says the people who need to pay those taxes are the people at the very top that benefit the most. Williams wants to make sure everyone is paying taxes, especially the rich. He believes if Obama would have been allowed to raise taxes the budget would be balanced. Williams also believes a balanced budget amendment would be bad in case the nation has an emergency and needs to borrow money.
My Thoughts
Before going on I want to address the balanced budget amendment. The fiscal conservative side of me likes the idea. But the realist in me understands it would do nothing. South Dakota is an example. The SD Constitution requires the legislature to have a balanced budget. This leaves many people believing the state is debt free. But in reality the State over the years has been increasing its use of bonds to do things like get new buildings or get more land. This debt is not counted in the budget. I have more on this in an upcoming post. But at the national level I think the same will happen; a balanced budget amendment will force Congress to rely even more heavily upon debt than it does now.
Thune
Thune expanded upon this saying tax reform is needed. He noted large tax increases that did happen during the Obama administration, such as from Obamacare. He also hammered the point hard that Williams wants to raise all taxes. Thune instead wants to get rid of exclusions and reduce the rates.
Williams
Williams says the policies Thune advocates were tried by Bush, and it almost put the world into economic collapse. Instead he believes there should be public works programs to expand the economy. Specifically, Williams believes moving the electric grid from fossil fuels to renewables would be a great public works program that would create economic growth.
Rissler wanted Williams to respond to whether SD needs more taxes. He says he is not focused on state issues, since he is running for federal office. But he does think there should be a business income tax in South Dakota. He also notes most states have a personal income tax and doesn’t seem opposed to it in South Dakota. He says it is our duty to pay taxes as a citizen of the US. Williams contends South Dakotans thinks it’s not fair not to pay for things; which taxes pay for government services.
Thune
Thune interjected to say he doesn’t think most South Dakotans would agree with a one dollar per gallon increase on gas tax. Also he believes the carbon tax on electricity Williams promotes would hurt hard-working people in South Dakota.
Williams
Williams says this is about the environment. He says there has to be programs to address what carbon is doing to the environment. He wants to use the carbon tax to reduce the amount of carbon in the environment. Williams contends the effects of climate change will hurt people worse than the carbon tax. On the gas tax Williams says he hasn’t advocated a specific amount, but thinks there should be “a big tax on gasoline to make people move away from gasoline”. Williams notes he drives an electric car and that is what other people should be doing. He thinks this has to be done quickly.
Foreign Policy
A question about what changes need to be made to ensure safety from groups like ISIS
Williams
Williams contends we have been safe, with only minor incidents since 9/11. He thinks we need to be smart in dealing with fundamentalists. Williams believed after 9/11 we should have gone to Afghanistan and other middle-east countries with humanitarian missions. Instead the US went to war, and he believes that was a mistake. He believes making allies of people in the area would have made it easier for us to deal with the truly bad people over there. He believes it is better to battle against hate of the US.
Thune
Thune notes so many mistakes have been made by Obama that it has made things worse. He believes the missteps by Obama have led to the rise of ISIS. Thune says Williams is “fundamentally wrong” and terrorists only understand strength. He believes we need to go in strong and fight it there. He also says we need to vet those that come into the country. And finally, he believes the intelligence tools domestically need to be worked on.
Williams
Williams interjected to say refugees are vetted and that the terrorist incidents we’ve had in the US are homegrown. In particular he called out “right-wing fascist” hating the US. This is also when Williams called out Thune for publicly signing a letter asking Iran not to deal with Obama. Williams also notes that working with other countries is what really projects strength, and not bombs.
Thune
Thune says the deal with Iran basically puts them on a path towards nuclear capability. He also notes Iran funds many terrorist organizations, and now Obama has given them capacity to cause even more terror. Thune says the letter went out because Obama bypassed Congress and went to the UN.
Thune and Williams bickered over this for a while…
My thoughts
Here is an area I am going to agree with pieces of both candidates. First I agree with Williams that we should have been working on making more allies than enemies in the Middle East. Bombing the hell out of these countries really isn’t solving anything. If we had been working on humanitarian or diplomatic missions in the region we could have helped locals to defeat actual terrorists, instead of helping to create more. But at the same time I believe we need to address refugees differently. While in the Army I was deployed to a country that was actively being bombed by the US, and understand just how much it pisses people off to have their friends and family killed by American bombs, even if it was “for them”. I would say for any country that American is currently bombing, which includes Syria, we should not be bringing in any refugees. There is no way to truly vet who we are pissing off with our actions.
On a side-note, I’m not sure it was smart of Williams to use a phrase like right-wing fascist running for office in a Red State.
Another side-note. I agree Obama was wrong bypassing Congress. He likes to say Congress won’t work with him, yet there are many times he has not even tried.
Social Security
Rissler notes a lot of South Dakotans are reliant upon Social Security and asks if the candidates will do anything secure SS for future generations.
Williams
Williams says the worse thing that could happen with SS is to privatize it. The first thing he would do is remove the cap on the SS tax so wages over about $120,000 could be taxes. He would also find a way to pay back the Social Security Trust Fund that keeps getting borrowed from. If that is done he believes it will be there for his grandchildren.
Thune
Thune doesn’t believe a tax increase should be the first thing to do, like Williams wants by removing the SS cap. To make SS sustainable for future generations he believes the programs need to be made more efficient. One change would be to phase in retirement age increases over a period of time. He would also look at income testing reforms.
Agriculture
A question about the importance of agriculture at the national level.
Thune
Thune noted he has been a member of the Ag committee and created portions of three farm bills. He helped worked on the provision for a livestock disaster program. In the next farm bill he wants to ensure the crop insurance is strong. He also wants ensure there are disaster relief programs. And Thune believes there should be new ways to encourage conservation. Finally Thune says there should be provisions to help new farmers, which is hard due to high land prices.
Williams
Williams agrees with most of what Thune says. Williams noted Thune voted against the farm bill in 2013, but then voted for it in 2014. Due to Thune and other Republicans voting against the farm bill in 2013 Williams believes people should vote Democrat.
Thune
Thune jumped in to note Democrats Sen Tim Johnson and Sen Tom Daschle voted against voted against four of six farm bills their time in office.
Cyber-security
This was a question about hackers at the consumer level.
Williams
Williams noted this is a big issue. He brought up Wikileaks and the fact hacking was used to get emails. Williams noted he is in the tech industry and understands it pretty well. To help with this he would have programs in place to ensure there are adequate firewalls. Additionally he thinks there needs to be education to let people know how unsecured the internet is.
Thune
Thune notes this is a real issue for seniors; who are getting preyed upon. He noted a bill passed into law to give the FTC more authority to go after people using fraud against elderly targets.
My Thoughts
Here is another area Williams really lost me. As a fellow techie (I’m a former Network Engineer) it was disappointing to hear Williams speak badly about Wikileaks. Yes, hacking was done to get those emails and that is wrong. But… The very reason Wikileaks really exists is because of a lack of transparency in the government and the political elite. I am very disappointed in particular with Democrats such as Williams speaking badly about Wikileaks now that Clinton has been shown to be not so honest. They were huge advocates of Wikileaks when bad things about the Bush administration were brought to life.
Closing Statements
Thune
Thune focused on a strong voice for South Dakota.
Williams
Williams focused on him not being a politician.
My Final Thoughts
I think both candidates did quit well in this debate. I really expected Williams to bomb, since he is not a politician. I think he was pretty well-spoken. But I would have to give Thune the win. I think Williams really took some stances that are just too far left for a Republican state. Thune mirrored more of what I hear from South Dakotans as I travel the state.
The post A look at the SDPB US Senate debate between Thune and Williams appeared first on SoDakLiberty.