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Would a Special Prosecutor Be Worth the Cost to Taxpayers?
Lisa Boothe: Absolutely. The Obama administration has shown their cards. You had Loretta Lynch sit on a plane with Bill Clinton during an investigation and there's also reports that the Department of Justice turned down the FBI's request to investigate the Clinton Foundation on public corruption charges. The reality is Hillary Clinton is running to be commander in chief of this great nation, and while she was the nation's top diplomat it looks like her influence was for sale. Look at the Associated Press report: 55 percent of the nongovernment individuals she sat down with or took phone calls with were Clinton Foundation donors. The business times, they reported that arms sales to governments that donated to the Clinton Foundation increased under her watch. Look at The New York Times who reported about uranium in a deal that Hillary Clinton approved as secretary of state, that gave Russia 20 percent of the U.S.'s uranium and donors behind that deal as well. So, you've got to have someone independently come in here. We can't trust the DOJ.
Jessica Tarlov: As a Democrat, we know I love to spend money, I'm not going to take that argument there. I understand the cause for concern and, you know, very liberal publications like The Washington Post have said that the Clinton Foundation should disband and hand their operations over to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. I understand the concern. As to the AP report which Lisa cited, a lot of people have torn that apart. 55 percent of the nongovernment people that she had meetings with were also donors, you're not talking about the thousands of other people who are government officials she met with and also talking about the AP went off about Mohammad Eunice and Eli Wiesel, a new low there. The GOP just wants to hammer this over and over because Donald Trump is sinking and they think that this what is they can do, make her seem so untrustworthy she won't get elected. It's not going to work.
John Layfield: I agree with everything you said. And remember the DOJ did not investigate the ties between the Clinton foundation and the secretary of state. They investigated the emails which they said that no prosecutor, reasonable prosecutor, would suggest criminal prosecution. But here's the issue. Look, remember Whitewater, the president -- with the Clintons, President Clinton and Mrs. Clinton, you had a special prosecutor in Ken Starr, he spent tens of millions of dollars. The only indictment from the sec investigation of the McDougal's not from the special prosecutor. James Comey, the FBI director, then deputy attorney general under President Bush, has said that the only reason for a special prose caution if there's going to be a criminal charge, not just a finding of more facts. I don't think you're going to see a criminal charge. It's unethical, it's wrong, be yes. I think a lot of people in Washington, D.C. Are doing it. As far as a criminal prosecution this isn't going to happen so a waste of money to get a special prosecutor.
Jonas Max Ferris: If you expanded it to all politicians I'm pretty sure the list of politicians that took phone calls or made appointments with rich people who gave them money or might have given them money down the road is a long list that you would be spending a lot of taxpayer money. I will say broadly speaking the concept here, that the government could use money to actually find out what these people have done, not just one side like this would be, but like we have this fun, this presidential election campaign fund, like a quarter billion dollar slush fund. It's hard to become an FBI agent, become the president, why don't they do a credit check on limited tax analysis, criminal checks, background. Like I don't know what either one has done when it goes down to it over long periods of time. They're running for president and it's a government job. We take other government jobs, do drug tests we don't know those results. Make weird accusations about her health and this is crooked. Why doesn't the government do all that and give the voters so we can make decisions.
Gary B. Smith: Well, Dagen, there's where I come down on this. One, why they're not going after them is because Hillary Clinton is a Democratic candidate. If it was reversed around and Donald Trump had the Donald Trump foundation and he was a politician they would be going after him, I think. But maybe I'm a little more cynical. I understand all the points and the rousing that Lisa made and I agree with them, but here's the thing, the Clintons are smart. As john kind of implied, you're not going to find anything dirty that they did. Even if you did what are you going to find? They're politicians, they're influenced by money. My God, it's like saying there's ambitious people in Washington, D.C. So waste a couple million dollars with all these prosecutors. It will all come out they will find nothing, maybe some frivolous stuff, the Clintons will say see, we did nothing wrong. Again, pain I'm cynical, it's all going to come to nothing and I would rather at this point not waste taxpayers' money to find out something we already know.
Will Free Market Take Care of EpiPen Controversy?
John Layfield: Absolutely. What we need is an anti-stupid pill and we need to take it to D.C. And distribute it freely. Look, this is the way the free market should work. The super sandy relief bill we had money in the initial bill for fisheries in Alaska. Now you want these guys to investigate someone else? Two candidates America doesn't want, 538 members of Congress that 90 percent of America disapprove with. This is a distraction. Look at what happened to the touring CEO when he hiked the aids pill. He pretty much ruined his entire career. That's exactly what is happening right now to this pharmaceutical company and this CEO. This is how the free market should work. Congress needs to stay away.
Gary B. Smith: Well, you could say certainly the publicity is working. For people to say the free market is working I disagree. Not because what I'm against what Mylan is doing. I disagree on the grounds that there is no free market in this. The government is mucking things up. Per John's point there are competitors to this, I don't think I'm pronouncing that right; they had a product recalled by the FDA. Teva had a product out there that was blocked by the FDA. It's not the epinephrine that's expensive. That's like aspirin. It's the injection device. The FDA is getting there and mucking up. People think why don't we have low health care prices? Why? Because we have the government involved. There's no free market in this area or there was a free market in health care, you better believe that the costs of the Epipen would be a few dollars. But there isn't. This is the government's fault, not Mylan's fault.
Jessica Tarlov: I understand what you're saying and I think actually that pharma companies have taken a little extra heat going through this process because they have to invest billions of dollars to bring these medicines to market. Actually here the government did play a very crucial role in the outrage to get as much publicity for Mylan to self-correct. The government was useful. I totally take Gary's points.
Lisa Boothe: The sense that there is no competition and the marketplace because Mylan has had a monopoly on this product and that's the problem. There needs to be more competition to drive those prices down. A large part of that is because of patent restrictions at an earlier point and also the FDA's red tape. If anyone needs to be investigated it's the FDA and why these competitors have been blocked by the FDA.
Jonas Max Ferris: It's an injectable $1 drug they're selling for $500. The bottom line there's a little right and wrong on what everyone is saying. The drug is very complicated and the drug companies have been running like hedge funds, do sleazy stuff and buy a cheap drug no one making it for a while charge a lot for a while they have a few years on the patent, it was cheap and no one wanted to make it. All because the government creates a monopoly with patents on drugs and device patents. If there was no government which everyone seems to think we want. There was no patent protection you wouldn't spend any money to make a drug because everyone would make it for a dollar after you make it. You need the government protected patent and government regulation. So many areas, yes. The FDA is slow-mo with the competitors but also Medicare can't negotiate the price of these things for some crazy reason. They should be able to negotiate if it's a monopoly situation. They should be able to call the price on 800 milligrams of Ibuprofen which is $3.
Second Grade Teacher in Texas Implements No-Homework Policy for the Year
Jessica Tarlov: I'm astounded by this. Second graders shouldn't have such a heavy load of homework there needs to be a policy like this. Definitely second grade, 7, 8 years old, you should be having mandatory reading your parents could do with you, I would have preferred that as a suggestion. She did say if you didn't finish your work during the day you have to get it done at night.
Jonas Max Ferris: The average second grader is doing 20 minutes of homework. The only person is working is the teacher. You have to grade the homework assignment. I can see why the teacher doesn't want to do this. I would have loved to say -- these papers are all stupid anyway. Is this how it works you get a 10-minute assignment from a teacher. You read Wikipedia for 20 minutes.
Gary B. Smith: I'm kind of mixed. To be honest. I don't think no homework is the right answer. I mean in what area athletics, music, academics, do people excel with no extra time? The other part, we are being annihilated across the board worldwide by countries like Finland, Japan, China, on their skill level even from the second grade on. I can assure you they're doing more than zero homework. The other points it's correct, they are 7, 8 years old. They're not going to get three hours of homework but yeah, 30, 40 minutes of homework is fair.
Lisa Boothe: I think for a second grader limited homework however I don't trust public schools anymore and so I would want to be able to see some of the stuff that they're learning to make sure they're not being indoctrinated with liberal policies.
John Layfield: Exactly. Our kids are coming out of school as dumb as they went in. We're -- our system is failing, guys. We're ranked somewhere between 14th and 30th in the world right now despite spending more money than everybody else. And when you look at no homework we have great teachers and schools overall our system is failing. Look at Finland. They do three hours a day of school, zero homework.
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