Rep. Connie Mack Sounds Off on Debt Bill

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Rep. Connie Mack Sounds Off on Debt Bill

Florida congressman on super committee, fiscal responsibility

This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," August 3, 2011. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

SEAN HANNITY, HOST: And the economic and political fallout from the debt ceiling fiasco is far from over, now while it likely helped America avoid a government default. The deal did nothing to address our deficit and issues of the left, it left wide open a possible downgrade in our credit rating, and that's something that Moody's is still threatening. And now the focus shifts to the so-called super committee, which will recommend how to cut another $1.5 trillion from the deficit supposedly by Thanksgiving. Sounds like a pending round two of the great debt debate. Joining me with reaction, in-studio tonight, Florida congressman, the one and only Connie Mack. I've been talking a lot to you and about you lately.

REP. CONNIE MACK, R-FL.: Absolutely. Thank you for that by the way.

HANNITY: I even got Donald Trump to endorse your deal today. He's been watching, and you know, he's like, that makes perfect sense to me, why don't we? He wanted to know if it was real. If it really works.

MACK: Yeah, it works, you know, before we introduced the bill, we made sure that as we went through the bill-writing process, we went and had everybody checked out the numbers. This is a plan that's simple, as you know. It works. And it solves our problems.

HANNITY: Did you have it CBO-scored?

MACK: No. It doesn't get scored until it's coming from the floor.

HANNITY: OK. So now, in the course of this, Louie Gohmert told me and Paul Ryan confirmed this. Paul Ryan is going to vote this out of committee, the idea that we're going to have a vote on the baseline, and speaker Boehner told Louie Gohmert that he would support it. Just so everyone knows what we're talking about. Your Mack-Penny Plan is?

MACK: It is really simple. So, for six years, we're gonna take -- we're gonna cut one percent of spending for six years.

HANNITY: Wait. We're going to freeze at 2011 levels?

MACK: That's right.

HANNITY: 3.6 trillion?

MACK: That's right. 3.6, some trillion. So, we're going to freeze it at that level. Then, we're going to take one percent a year for six years.

HANNITY: Cut one percent.

MACK: Cut one percent.

HANNITY: One penny out of every dollar?

MACK: One penny out of every dollar. Everybody has had to take more than one penny out of every dollar of their home budget, of their business budget. This isn't a big lift, and Washington can do it. Then we cap spending to 18 percent of GDP in the seventh year. And in the eighth year, the budget is balanced, and after 10 years we cut $7.5 trillion. All of this talk about the cuts, the supposed cuts that happened in this last bill that passed, those aren't cuts. Those are fantasy cuts, those are reductions in the rate of growth. And everyone knows if you continue to spend $1.6 trillion more than you bring in, you have to borrow that money, it adds to the debt. We can't continue to do that.

HANNITY: Your fellow Floridian Marco Rubio I think spelled it out best when he was giving his arguments. He said look, we spend -- we take in what, $180 billion a month, right?

MACK: Uh-huh.

HANNITY: We spent $120 billion more. So, we spend $300 billion.

MACK: That's right.

HANNITY: But we only take in 180. So, we borrow $120 billion or 40 cents of every dollar they spend we borrow. How could you not become Greece, how could you not become bankrupt?

MACK: Sean, can you imagine if that was an individual? Can you imagine if an individual went to a bank and tried to get a credit card?

HANNITY: Good luck.

MACK: No way, the debt to income ratio is so out of whack, you wouldn't even have a -- they would laugh you out of the bank.

HANNITY: You know, look, I'm supporting this plan because I think it makes the most sense. I really believe the House Republicans would want to do this. Obviously, it's a nonstarter in the Senate. And certainly, the president, he always wants to raise taxes, that's his answer after he spent all this money and increased discretionary spending, 84 percent. How is the momentum growing? Marco Rubio signed on to this?

MACK: That's right.

HANNITY: Utah Senator Mike Lee signed onto this?

MACK: That's right. Kay Bailey Hutchison has signed on it.

HANNITY: Kay Bailey, I know that, yeah, and who else, Rand Paul, obviously?

MACK: Rand Paul. So, that's in the Senate. We have 57 people who have signed onto the bill in the House. It's growing. People coming to me every day. And look, Sean, you know what's amazing about this, it's gone from, you know, an idea that we've kind of come up with some grassroots organizations, came up with this. Now it's growing. I mean, so it's not just conservatives. It's moderate Republicans.

HANNITY: Independents. MACK: Independents.

HANNITY: Yeah.

MACK: It's Democrats. There are Democrats who look at it and say, this makes sense, you know.

HANNITY: Is there any Democrat that's signed on to it yet or are they too afraid of their leadership?

MACK: Not yet. But I think we'll get there. I think a lot of them were waiting until after this debt ceiling, because from the other side, they said, look, we're not doing anything on the debt ceiling, unless we raise taxes so --

HANNITY: You know, what's frustrating in this, and -- because, alright, we keep telling the country we're going to save $2 trillion. We just saved $2 trillion. But really in this 10-year period, we're going to give the president $900 billion. In two years, we're only going to save $67 billion, or cut $67 billion, but we're still increasing spending every year. Isn't that -- this is what people don't understand. The baseline is we -- we are assuming that spending growth goes up eight percent a year every year for eight years.

MACK: Yeah. It's amazing, isn't it? So, what's really sad about this, is if we -- if we tried to make the cuts that we needed -- that were needed, everybody in Congress would say, no, no, no, those are drastic cuts. But those are things -- this is increases. Nobody thinks that we should be increasing spending right now. We're broke!

HANNITY: You know, and that's the funny. But all of these issues get demagogued, all of them.

MACK: Yeah.

HANNITY: So, what you put in place is Congress can decide how they want to cut. They can cut this program 15 percent, this program 10 percent, and even increase spending in another program, but if they don't do it, it's across-the-board bottom line.

MACK: That's right.

HANNITY: And you've got to live within your means.

MACK: So, that's the trigger in all this, is that if you do not -- if the Congress fails to act and make the requisite one percent, then it'll be across the board.

HANNITY: Can you do this without modifying and adjusting Social Security and Medicare, or do you really have to deal with that?

MACK: We would have to make reforms to Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid. But if we don't do that, you know, no matter what program -- if we want to balance the budget, you have to take on the entitlements.

HANNITY: Where can people read about the Mack-Penny Plan?

MACK: They can go to my official Web site at Mack.house.gov. There's a little link in there. They can go to it, they can go to my campaign site, Conniemack.com. And sign a petition, so, we're going to continue to push this.

HANNITY: Your district is my adopted district, you know, in southwest Florida.

MACK: And we're proud to have you there, Sean.

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: Not everybody. Most people. Alright, alright, Congressman, good to see you.

MACK: Thank you. Good to see you.

HANNITY: And coming up, the Tea Party flexed its muscle during the debt debate, but could 2012 prove to be the group's big political moment? We'll examine that. Plus, she slammed the president and took a swipe at Mitt Romney right here on "Hannity" last night.

Michelle Malkin is here to react to Governor Sarah Palin's tough remarks, coming up, straight ahead.

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