Fox Hannity & Colmes - Transcript

Title: FOX HANNITY & COLMES
Date: 9/17/03
Location: Unknown

HEADLINE: Interview With Tom McClintock

GUESTS: Tom McClintock

BYLINE: Sean Hannity, Alan Colmes

BODY:
HANNITY: Monday's ruling to postpone the California recall has thrown a wrench into the campaigns of Arnold Schwarzenegger and the other candidates to unseat Governor Gray Davis. Will any of them drop out?

Joining us now from Los Angeles, California state senator and gubernatorial candidate, Tom McClintock, is back on the program.

Tom, welcome back. Good to see you, my friend.

TOM MCCLINTOCK ®, CALIFORNIA GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: Thanks for having me.

HANNITY: What do you think? Does it concern you if, in fact, this is delayed?

MCCLINTOCK: Yes. I mean, for a federal court to come in and delay a constitutionally called election is unprecedented in a nation that values its democratic institutions. The punch card ballots to which they object were exactly the same devices that elected Gray Davis just 11 months ago.

HANNITY: Yes. I agree with you. And constitutionally it's supposed to be 80 days after the election. This is the same system that got the assembly elected, the Senate elected and Gray Davis elected. It's only a year ago. And we don't have any guarantee the new system is going to be up and running effectively even if, in fact, they move this date.

MCCLINTOCK: Actually, we have a number of warnings from counties that that would be very, very difficult for them to meet a March deadline, given the size of this ballot, with 135 candidates on it.

HANNITY: Let me ask you this question. You know something, Tom? I'm a supporter of yours. I think you're a good man. I think you are a rising star, not only in California politics. I'll even make a prediction, I think probably nationally.

And I've gone through this with you a couple times. I think Arnold Schwarzenegger is a good man, a little liberal on some social issue. But I think he's a far better candidate, as you would be, than Gray Davis or Mr. Bustamante.

My fear and the fear of others, Tom, is that what's ultimately going to happen is you guys are going vote yes on recall out there. You guys are going to split the Republican vote and Bustamante would win when he couldn't, if it wasn't split.

Now, my question to you is, and I'm going to give this question to Arnold in a scheduled interview I have with him. If seven days out of this election, you're not winning and you're not catching up to Arnold, would you pull out and unite behind one candidate?

MCCLINTOCK: Well, Sean, we've heard those fears before. And they're legitimate fears.

In fact, let me tell you about an open letter from Republican legislators in the governor's race. They put it to him—this is a quote. They put it to him humbly and asked him, quote, "to search your conscience, rise above any personal ambition and get behind George Christopher for governor." Reagan, to no one's surprise declined. That was the "Saturday Evening Post," June 4, 1966. So we've heard that song before.

ALAN COLMES, CO-HOST: Listen, Tom, it's Alan. Welcome to the program. I've been saying all along, you are the true conservative in the race. Does it gall you that many conservatives are going with Arnold, who is liberal on a whole host of issues? That's got to gall you.

MCCLINTOCK: Well, I think what you're going to find in the closing days of the campaign, just as you saw in Reagan's campaign in 1966, and again in 1980 when the same objection was made.

"We love him. He's a great guy. Makes a great governor, a great president, but he just can't win." And as he began to demonstrate that he could, you saw an—that argument just disappeared and you saw an avalanche of supporters moving his column in the final days of the campaign.

I think that's exactly what we're going to see in California as people realize that our momentum is continuing.

COLMES: Is the momentum, is it aided by a later election? Could the March date be better for you?

MCCLINTOCK: Well, whether it's better for not is irrelevant, Alan. This is a question over some of our most fundamental democratic values.

We proceeded with scheduled elections even in the middle of a civil war. This is a constitutionally called election. It is one that is under the state's constitution on a very tight time frame, because it is a disruptive influence in the public discourse. And the whole idea was, under these extraordinary circumstances, when the people felt they needed to recall an unsatisfactory public servant, they could do it quickly and get it behind them.

COLMES: But you know the Supreme Court made a decision in Bush versus Gore that is precedent for what the Ninth Circuit said, according to the Ninth Circuit. And that the equal protection clause comes into play, which trumps the state constitution, if you want to agree with what the Ninth Circuit said, which is keeping, according to them, with Bush versus Gore.

MCCLINTOCK: What the Supreme Court said in Florida is you can't change the rules in the middle of the game. And yet, that is exactly what the Ninth Circuit Court is attempting to do in California.

COLMES: But the Supreme Court said otherwise, and the Supreme Court if it's going to be consistent, wouldn't it then have to rule, as it did in Bush versus Gore, and vote the equal protection clause?

MCCLINTOCK: On the contrary, what the Supreme Court said is you can't change the rules in midstream. We have been operating under a clear set of rules, a clear balloting process that has been used without incident in California for over a generation. It was good enough to elect Gray Davis just a few months ago.

I might also add, my race for controller in last year's statewide election was the closest statewide election in California history. It was 23 one-hundredths of 1 percent of the vote. We never considered demanding a recount because of the accuracy of the punch cards in California.

HANNITY: All right. We've got to take a break. We'll continue more with gubernatorial candidate Tom McClintock coming up after the break.

And also coming up, would postponing the recall help Gray Davis? Or just delay the inevitable? California Congressman Bob Filner, he'll join us.

And then just as I predicted, General Wesley Clark declared his Democratic candidacy for the president today. Is it too late for him to jump into the race? We'll debate that with Ann Coulter.

And later, did Bill Clinton and Gray Davis cross the line by campaigning in a church? The Reverend Jesse Lee Peterson weighs in heavily on that issue.

A busy night, straight ahead. Stay with us.

(NEWSBREAK)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: Later on in the show, you can add one more list to the Democratic contenders. Will the general give his competition a run for their money?

And Bill Clinton can't seem to do anything right, according to some people. Now he's under attack for speaking at a church. We'll tell you why.

Back to California gubernatorial candidate Tom McClintock. There were stories that you met with Peter Ueberroth. Is that true?

MCCLINTOCK: Yes.

COLMES: And what did he say to you?

MCCLINTOCK: Well, he offered a number of ideas, not only on policy changes for the state government, but also offered what I consider brilliant legislative insight in breaking some of the gridlock that we've been facing in Sacramento. The man really is an extraordinary individual.

COLMES: Is he going to support you?

MCCLINTOCK: That's a decision he's going to be making on his own timetable and according to his own best lights. But I would certainly welcome his endorsement.

COLMES: You've got to...

MCCLINTOCK: And I will say this: whatever he decides, and whoever wins as governor, the next governor would be well advised to have him in a leading role to chart our course out of this recession, as he chartered our course out of the recession in the 1990's.

COLMES: So are you saying if you become governor, you will give Pete Ueberroth a formal role in the state house?

MCCLINTOCK: And I would recommend whoever is the next governor of California to do the same.

COLMES: What would you ask him to do?

MCCLINTOCK: The same thing that he did in the early 1990's to chart California's course out of recession. He headed up what was called the Ueberroth Commission that made a long list of urgent changes to state law that got us out of the recession.

COLMES: Well, who else would you use in your governorship, if you had the opportunity?

MCCLINTOCK: Well, on the economic side, I'd set up a bureaucracy reduction and closure commission, based on the federal military base realignment and closure commission that successfully closed 90 obsolete military bases and saved $20 billion.

That mechanism needs to be turned on the state's bureaucracy. So I proposed that in the legislature for seven years running now. The nice thing about the governor's office, that can be done without legislative action, just with the executive authority of the governor.

HANNITY: Tom, now that you're talking about Peter Ueberroth. I mean, would you consider Bill Simon? Would you consider Darrell Issa?

MCCLINTOCK: Absolutely

HANNITY: Would you consider Arnold Schwarzenegger?

MCCLINTOCK: Yes. Arnold Schwarzenegger is one of the best filmmakers we have in Hollywood today, and I think that film development would be an outstanding contribution he could make.

HANNITY: All right, Tom. But would you, if it comes down to you start taking over in the polls, would you want him to sort of form a coalition with you?

MCCLINTOCK: Well, I'd certainly welcome support from all quarter. But my agenda is a no tax pledge. I'm the only candidate who's taken that pledge.

HANNITY: No.

MCCLINTOCK: There will not be any tax increases under this administration.

HANNITY: Well, he said, and I specifically went over this with him and I'll do it again when I have another scheduled interview with him.

But he specifically said no new taxes to get out of the budgetary crisis, but if there were a natural emergency, a severe earthquake, or something like that, that's the only reason. He doesn't say under any circumstances. I don't find that unreasonable. Do you?

MCCLINTOCK: Well, he said emergencies, like natural disasters. Let me point out, that's the reason you have a budget reserve. What makes you think that raising taxes in this day is going to produce more revenue?

HANNITY: I'm against it.

MCCLINTOCK: My point is the last time we did that in 1991, we actually brought in less total revenue after the tax increases went into effect...

HANNITY: I understand.

MCCLINTOCK: ... than we took in the year before they went into effect.

HANNITY: I'm a big tax cutter. Don't misunderstand what I'm saying here. But if he took over and one week into his governorship or yours, there was an—God forbid, by the way—some natural disaster or an earthquake or something. That would be a circumstance. You don't have a budget surplus.

MCCLINTOCK: But Sean, then raising taxes would be the very last thing you would want to do, because that would actually reduce your revenues by harming the economy. We've had that experience before in 1991.

COLMES: Hope to see you again soon. We're certainly intensely following the campaign. Thank you for coming on HANNITY & COLMES.

And coming up, we continue our debate with the other side. Democratic congressman from California Bob Filner will join us.

And the Democratic field just picked up one more, but does General Clark have what it takes to lead the Democratic troops to victory? That debate tonight on HANNITY & COLMES.

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