'Meet the Press' transcript for June 14, 2009

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Look, I'll tell you where the tough choices are.  First of all, we submitted our budget, the first honest budget you or anybody's seen in eight years.  We put in the budget the cost of the wars, we--which hadn't been done before.  We put in the budget the estimate of what's going to be required for natural disasters.  We've counted--we, we did it honestly, number one. Number two, this so-called PAYGO which they're talking about, how we're paying for what we're going to do, PAYGO has never included anything other than those long-term programs which are going to have to--we're going to inherit.  Like, we had PAYGO during the Clinton administration.  We had a good budget, a good budget process.  Along came President Bush, he decided we weren't going to pay for the prescription drug program, we weren't going to pay for tax cuts in the future, which were trillions of dollars combined.  What we have done is the new programs we have put forward, ie healthcare, we've laid out exactly how we're going to pay for it, exactly how we're going to pay for it.  The things that we have not been able to lay out exactly how to pay for it are the things that already are in the law and the Congress has not prepared to take on right now, like the Bush tax cuts, like the prescription drug benefit, which will be affected by our healthcare plan.  So what did we do?  Unlike anyone else, we laid out there, we said, "This is how much the healthcare plan is going to cost, and here's how we're going to pay for it," and we've laid it out.  And we're going to pay for it.  Now, the Congress is going to mull over whether or not the way we want to pay for it is the right way.  They're either going to have to agree with us, come up with an alternative or we're not going to have healthcare.  And we're going to get healthcare.

MR. GREGORY:  Well, let's talk about healthcare.  Because if there's a fiscal train wreck, in the view of many, you're adding healthcare and insurance for everybody on top of it, which is expected to be at least a trillion-dollar new entitlement.  How do you possibly pay for that?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  You pay for it by the way we've laid it out.  We pay for it by eliminating some existing tax cuts that are out there, you pay for it by reforming Medicare and Medicaid, you pay for it by getting rid of the Medicare advantage.  You pay for it by a whole range of things which we've...

MR. GREGORY:  Including raising taxes.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Including--look, the taxes we're going to--that we propose to raise, to raise $300 billion, says that people making over $250,000 should have the same deduction schedule that they had with Ronald Reagan.  Instead of it being 39 percent, it should be 28 percent.  That's how we come up with an additional $300 billion.

MR. GREGORY:  Right.  Will the president sign a bill that taxes healthcare benefits for employees?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  We made it clear we do not think that is the way to go. We think that is the wrong way to finance this legislation.

MR. GREGORY:  So if the bill comes with that...

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  But--no, no, no.

MR. GREGORY:  ...the president wouldn't sign it?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  I didn't say that.  I said when the bill is going to come, this is the most--this is going to be one of the most comprehensive changes in law since Medicare in the beginning.  We'll have to see what the whole bill says.  But we made it clear we do not believe you should be taxing, taxing the benefits that people receive through their employers now.

MR. GREGORY:  Will the president sign a bill that does not include a public plan as an alternative to private insurance?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Again, we've made it clear that we think there should be a public plan.  But a public plan is on a continuum.  For example, there was a, there, there was a, a big headline saying the AMA says they won't support a public plan and no one will support a public plan.  Well, the truth of the matter is the AMA said certain kinds of public plans they might support.  So the question is, what is the public plan?  Is the public plan just, just Medicare?  Is that the public plan?  Do you add everybody onto Medicare who is going to need help?  Or is a public plan something further down the continuum? And I brought along the quote from the AMA.  It says, "The AMA is willing to consider other variations of a public plan that currently are under discussion in Congress.  These include a federally charged--or chartered co-op health plan, or level playing field options."

The--here's the reason for the public plan.  You've got to have some competition, David.  You've got to have some--and by the way, people say there's a lot of--in some states, some regions, there's not a lot of people competing.

MR. GREGORY:  Well, you know, Republicans, and there's a lot of Democrats who say this is a nonstarter.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  I know that.  But look, if we started off everything we thought we should do by the Congress saying that this is not something we're going to accept...

MR. GREGORY:  Right.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  ...and we said OK, we're going to start from, then we'd never get anything done.

MR. GREGORY:  So if a bill comes without a public plan, the president doesn't sign it?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Look, the bill the president is going to--with the bill that comes, the president is going to look at the totality of the bill and he's going to make a judgment, like every president has to have, where the single most--look, what's the reason we need healthcare?  The reason we need healthcare is not just moral, it is a fiscal responsibility.  We have health care going up over 50 percent per year premiums right now in the last seven years.  Up--not per year, 50 percent in the last six years.  That, that breaks the budget.  That makes us--that keeps us bankrupt for a long time.

MR. GREGORY:  The president wants public, a public plan in there.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  He does want a public plan.

MR. GREGORY:  Let me just pull back, we've gone through the domestic agenda a little bit, and ask you about where government intervention in this economy stops.  The government has a controlling stake in two auto companies, major stakes in the banks, an $800 billion stimulus, new regulatory powers that you're considering, regulation over how executives should be compensated, now big proposals on healthcare and energy.  When is it too much?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Let me tell you--let me ask it another way, if I can turn the question around.  How do you--how does anybody think we could possibly lead in the 21st century without a fundamental change in our energy policy, a fundamental change in our healthcare policy and taking control of the reckless, reckless lack of oversight that existed?  We just had a meeting at the G-20.  We just had a meeting of the world--the world's in recession.  What is the one thing they all agreed on, every country that we participated with? We need to have some fiscal--we need to have some control over the system that--so it can't run wild.

MR. GREGORY:  But what achievements can you point to, through all of this government regulation and government intervention, that you've achieved?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  David, well, we've achieved not losing about a million jobs by not letting the two automobile companies be liquidated.  I love these folks who go out there and say, "Why'd you get involved?" We got involved because the liquidation of these companies, which was the alternative, would have been immediately the next day 100,000 jobs lost, then all the suppliers go bankrupt, then the estimates are of a million people unemployed.

MR. GREGORY:  Right.  OK, so what's the exist strategy?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  The exit strategy is these--now that these car companies, for example...

MR. GREGORY:  Not just the car companies, though.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  OK.  Well, I mean, well...

MR. GREGORY:  A broad swath of government intervention.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  The exit strategy is that we, in fact--these companies where the United States government, through the TARP funding, has got engaged in helping them stay alive is that they begin--they are retooled, they are beginning to make money.  We get the hell, the heck out as quickly as we can. As the president says, we don't want any part...

MR. GREGORY:  Do you think...

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  ...of running any of these companies.

MR. GREGORY:  Do you think the taxpayer's ever going to see money again that we have imported to AIG or GM?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Yes.  Will they see all the money is a different question. Yes, they will see money again.

MR. GREGORY:  I want to return to a couple of...

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  And by the way, had we not done this, they'd all be in deep, deep, deep trouble.  Let all the banks fail, where would we have been? I love these folks who say we shouldn't have done anything.  At the time I didn't hear anybody saying that.

MR. GREGORY:  But it's still a major question as to whether the government can effectively run these companies.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Well, we're not trying to run the companies.  We've turned over the daily operation of these companies to the boards of directors of these companies.  We're not running these companies.

MR. GREGORY:  Right.  And you don't think there's going to be any meddling by the government or Congress in GM?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  No, there's not.  Once--by the way, the meddling occurred at the front end, saying...

MR. GREGORY:  Mm-hmm.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  ...look, all the stakeholders, in order to avoid liquidation, if you want us to put taxpayers' money into this, prove to us you have a workable plan.  So that's what they did.  GM cut out product lines that were redundant.  GM began to base their, their, their production models on a 10 million vehicles being sold a year, not 16 million.  That got realistic. Everybody sacrificed:  labor, debt holders, the company itself.

MR. GREGORY:  Mm-hmm.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  And now they have a company that will be coming out of bankruptcy, I predict, within the several months that will be able to compete.

MR. GREGORY:  Let me return to a couple of foreign policy notes...

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Sure.

MR. GREGORY:  ...in our remaining moments.  Israel.  Is the president trying to distance himself from Israel in order to assuage the Arabs?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Absolutely not.  Look, here...

MR. GREGORY:  If that's the case, then, why is this administration only making unconditional demands over settlements on Israel and on no other parties?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Well, they are make--we are making demands.  We're making demands both today...

MR. GREGORY:  Unconditional demands.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Look, look.  The president of the United States, in his speech to the Islamic world and the Islamic communities, stood there and said--and it's a paraphrase, I don't know the exact quote--we are unconditionally tied to Israel.  Israel's security is our security was in essence of what he said.  So he made it clear we're not distancing ourself from Israel.  What we say is that, look, what happened was all the parties signed onto a thing called the road map.  It was the thing that everybody said that would bring, result in a two-state solution.  The Israeli government signed onto that, the Palestinian Authority signed onto that, the Arab states blessed that.  That's what we want to see happen.  So we are moving all the parties as best we can toward keeping their part of the bargain.

MR. GREGORY:  Yeah.  But wait a minute, you were making an unconditional demand only on Israel and no other parties...

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  No.  No, we're not.

MR. GREGORY:  ...over settlements.  That's not the case?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  No, we're not.  No, that's not the case.  We are making...

MR. GREGORY:  What unconditional demand has this president made on the Arabs?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  The unconditional demands we're making on the Palestinians that they have to provide security for Israel.  They have to stop this, this, this, this baiting of their populations.  They have to stop incitement.  We've made it clear to the, to the Arab states, they have to do something more than just talk about normalizing relation with Israel.

MR. GREGORY:  Is there moral equivalency in the fight between Israelis and Palestinians, in your view?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  No.  No, there's not moral equivalency in...

MR. GREGORY:  Did the president suggest there was in his speech?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  I don't believe the president did suggest that.  What the, the president suggested is for the well-being of innocent Palestinians and Israelis, that what you need to do is you need a two-state solution along the lines that all the parties had heretofore agreed to, and we're going to use all of our diplomatic capability to move the parties toward actually implementing what they committed to.

MR. GREGORY:  You say sometimes you miss the Senate.  You are for the first time working where you're not the boss.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  That's right.

MR. GREGORY:  You're the vice president.  This is a section from "Renegade," the new book by Richard Wolffe called...

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Yeah.

MR. GREGORY:  About the making of the president.  And this is--he described you two meeting during the campaign:  "The two formal rivals clicked.  Biden didn't want a portfolio like Al Gore; he wanted to be consulted as a confidant and adviser.  For his part, Obama liked Biden's political advice and wanted to hear more." Are you as you wanted to be, as you told the president you wanted to be, the last guy he talks to you on a major decision?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  There's not a single major decision he's made I have not been able to get him alone or with one or two other people and make my--as a matter of fact, there's not a decision made he hasn't asked me my view. Whether I am the absolute last person, I can't guarantee that.  But I know that I am one of the last people that gets an opportunity...

MR. GREGORY:  Mm-hmm.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  ...to make the case to him.  And when he has a tough decision and if we're, if he's abroad and I'm, I'm at, I'm here or vice versa, he picks up the phones and he calls.  I think he values my opinion.  He doesn't have to accept my opinion, but he's kept his end of the bargain.  This has been a much better job than I ever anticipated.  Look, the biggest deal is I use to sit there and react to Supreme Court nominees.  I actually got to be in a position to help choose who the nominee would be.

MR. GREGORY:  Mm-hmm.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  It's a difference.  It's reactive vs.  being proactive. And I like the proactive part.

MR. GREGORY:  You've never been--you've never worked this close to a president before.  Are you sure you don't want to be one?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  No, no, no.  Look, we, we have the order of this operation correct.  We got the order correct.  He's the president, I'm the vice president.

MR. GREGORY:  But you don't want to become president?  You won't run?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Well, I didn't say that.  I think I--what, what I said was...

MR. GREGORY:  You still think about it.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  What I said was I think he's going to be a great president and I think he's off to a great start, and I'm glad to be a part of the team.

MR. GREGORY:  But you won't rule it out that you'll think about being president?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  No, I won't.  I won't rule that out.  No.

MR. GREGORY:  OK.

Size up the Republican Party right now.  You've got former Vice President Dick Cheney saying this administration is making the country weaker, you have Newt Gingrich saying it'd be better off if it were McCain-Palin, you've got Sarah Palin saying lots of things.  How do you size up the Republicans?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Look, I'll let your two commentators who know this do that in the roundtable after this.  I, I just know that there is a ferocious debate, appears to be a ferocious debate within the Republican Party of what they're going to look like in the future.  I was elected in 1972 as a 29-year-old kid.  My party went through the exact same thing.  I ran with George McGovern, we got clobbered nationally, I barely won here.  For the next two and half to four years we were in a very intense debate about the future of our party.  I think it's predictable.  I think the Republican Party will come out of this.  I think they'll come back, they'll be strong again.  The pendulum swings.

MR. GREGORY:  Do you see them really challenging this administration?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Well, I--well, they are challenging us now.  But what I'm saying is over time, just like we did, parties--the good thing about our system is we need two strong political parties.

MR. GREGORY:  Right.  You know...

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  And they'll be strong again.

MR. GREGORY:  You know Dick Cheney well.  Leon Panetta, head of the CIA, told the New Yorker this about his recent speech:  "I think [Cheney] smells some blood in the water on the national security issue.  It's almost, a little bit, gallows politics.  When you read behind it, it's almost as if he's wishing that this country would be attacked again, in order to make his point.  I think that's dangerous politics." Do you agree with that?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Look, I, I, I learned a long time ago from a guy named Mike Mansfield, never question another man's motive.  You've never once heard me in my entire career question a man's motive.  I think Dick Cheney's judgment about how to secure America is faulty.  I think our judgment is correct.  I don't question his motive.

MR. GREGORY:  Your son Beau is in Iraq.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Yes.

MR. GREGORY:  Serving America.

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Coincidentally, as I was walking out for this program, he called.  I just said--he said, "Dad, keep it short."

MR. GREGORY:  We certainly hope he's well.  He's also thought about politics. What advice have you given your son about a potential run for the Senate in this state?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  Whatever you decide to do, make sure there's something you're willing to lose over.  Don't just do it for--because it's the next step.  If you conclude that you care deeply about something that you're willing to lose over it in a campaign, then do it.

MR. GREGORY:  Would you like to see him run?

VICE PRES. BIDEN:  I think he'd make a great senator.  But, you know, I learned a long time ago that with him, anyway, that he is, he's his own man. He had an opportunity to be appointed attorney general, he wouldn't do it. There was even some speculation he had an opportunity to be appointed to the Senate, he wouldn't do it.  He decided he had to be with his guys.  And so this is--I'm going to say something that people are going to criticize.  This is the finest man I've ever known in my life is my son.

More from NBC News broadcasts   To fight crime, city hires ex-cons   20 years later, Wall’s fall still being felt   Army chief: More troops needed in Afghanistan Army releases names of Fort Hood fatalities House stages Saturday health showdown Warship built from Twin Towers’ remains Follow on Twitter: NBC News | msnbc

MORE FROM MEET THE PRESS

Meet the Press Section Front

Nov. 8: Casey, Barbour, Rendell, roundtable, Brokaw Nov. 1: Tim Geithner, David Plouffe, roundtable Oct. 25: Cornyn, Schumer, Burnett, Sorkin, roundtable Oct. 18: Jarrett, Dodd, Kyl, Shriver, Podesta Oct. 11: Levin, Graham, McCaffrey, Myers, roundtable Oct. 4: Ambassador Susan Rice, roundtable Sept. 27: Bill Clinton, Paterson, Kyl, Webb Sept. 20: President Obama, Sen. Graham, Rep. Boehner, roundtable Sept. 13: Durbin, Cornyn, Dean, Gingrich, roundtable Sept. 6: Axelrod, roundtable Meet the Press Section Front   Add Meet the Press headlines to your news reader: