On September 18, 2015, Bloomberg’s Mark Halperin interviews Senator Bernie Sanders:
In an interview with Bloomberg’s “With All Due Respect,” Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders said he would look to the defense budget for spending cuts and try to “make it a much more efficient budget than it is.”
First, Sanders tackles unemployment and macroeconomics.
MARK HALPERIN: Would the DOW go up under a Bernie Sanders administration? Does that matter to you?
BERNIE SANDERS: We have — yeah, it matters. When you have a productive economy with small and medium sized businesses doing well, the DOW will do just fine…
I think what we need — you can’t put a number to it. But what I beleive is if we invest in rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure. I’ve got a $1 trillion dollar bill that would offer 13 million jobs…
If we have a financial system that makes loans available to small and medium sized businesses, we can substantially reduce unemployment today.
We must also focus on youth unemployment, which is just off of the charts…
Next, Halperin asks for specifics about cutting the budget deficit…
BERNIE SANDERS: I find it interesting that the only federal agency which has never been audited is the Dept. of Defense. It hasn’t been able to audit itself or have an independent audit.
What I can tell you is virtually every major defense contractor has either reached a settlement with the U.S. government because of allegations of fraud or have been convicted of fraud.
You have massive cost overrun. One area we could take a hard look at is the defense budget.
