State of the Union Crib Sheet for Sunday March 17th 2013

Show Highlights

House Intelligence Committee Chairman, Rep. Mike Rogers (D- Michigan) and Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger (D- Maryland) joined Candy to discuss a range of global threats, from Iran and North Korea’s nuclear programs to Chinese cyberattacks.

On the weekend of the tenth anniversary of the Iraq war, two Iraq war veterans who are now in Congress, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard and Rep. Tom Cotton, looked back at the conflict.

After a speech at CPAC that was enthusiastically received by conservatives, Candy spoke with Dr. Ben Carson about his political philosophy and whether a run for elected office is in his future. Carson also joined our all-star political panel alongside Rep. Raul Grijalva, Kiki McLean and Al Cardenas.

Rep. Mike Rogers on the threat posed by North Korea

“They certainly have a ballistic missile that can reach U.S. Shores. They just recently had their third nuclear test and there was lots of speculation about test, lots of warning to the North Koreans not to do it, they pressed ahead. So you have a 28-year-old leader who is trying to prove himself to the military and the military eager to have a saber rattling for their own self-interest and the combination of that is proving to be very deadly. The sheer threat- that they'd openly threaten a nuclear attack against the United States- is problem enough but their military movements along the DMZ, the Demilitarized Zone in North Korea; a whole new set of problems for us.”

Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger on cybersecurity

“We’re having attacks as we speak right now… We have attacks right now. We know our Wall Street has been attacked. We have - we have the capability of other countries including Iran for destructive attacks to knock out our grid system, to attack some of our banks. We know that China, especially, has probably stolen more trade secrets, which relates to jobs and money. The largest amount of theft in the history of the world, and we have got to stop this.”

Rep. Tulsi Gabbard on the Iraq war

“One of the problems that we've seen today as well as we saw throughout the time that we spent there is victory was not clearly defined. We had many different things, taking out Saddam Hussein, we had a civil war that really between the Shia and the Sunni and we also had the threat of Al Qaeda and terrorists, and our I think miscalculation there of fighting this unconventional threat, these unconventional terrorists who know no allegiance to a specific flag or country with very conventional tactics.”

Rep. Tom Cotton on whether the Iraq war was worth it

“I would say it was worth it, but it was also a little bit too soon to tell because there's nothing ever certain in human affairs but if you look at the accomplishment of our troops in Iraq, they deposed an evil tyrant who was an aggressive international dictator, he invaded across two boundaries, he had demonstrated the ability and the will to use weapons of mass destruction. He was believed by every western government including senior high-ranking officials in President Obama's cabinet right now to be developing new weapons. He was in violation of numerous U.N. resolutions. Under those conditions I think, as I said, it was a just and noble war.”

Dr. Ben Carson on his political allegiance

“I am a registered Independent….if I were asked to come to a Democratic convention and to give my views, I’d be happy to.”

VIDEO LINKS

Reps. Rogers and Ruppersberger

http://wp.me/p1zIBN-1qt

Robert Gates on Iraq War Legacy

http://wp.me/p1zIBN-1qw

Reps. Gabbard and Cotton

http://wp.me/p1zIBN-1qC

Ben Carson

http://wp.me/p1zIBN-1qF

Political Panel