Sen. Sanders: Why I voted 'no' on filibuster reform

>> independent senator bernie sanders to talk more about that. as she said, senator, and welcome to you, gun control just one of many issues congress is going to have to deal with. debt ceiling debate now postponed until may. the sequestering, the continuing resolution. and republicans are pushing for changes in entitlements. is this in large part about where the white house decides where to put its political capital ?

>> kwlourks know what, we have also forgotten in this discussion, we remain in the midst of a terrible, terrible recession. counting people who have given up looking for work and underemployed. we are looking at -- almost 15% of our population who is unemployed, who don't have jobs. real wages for millions of workers are going down. the gap between the very, very wealthy and everybody else is growing wider. so what concerns me is, yeah, you have to deal with gun control . deal with a lot of other issues, but we cannot -- we cannot forget the reality that tens and tens of millions of working people are really hurting.

>> how would you prioritize then again if you have to figure out where you're going to put your political capital ? how would you prioritize. there was a big headline today the stock market is at a five-year high, unemployment at a five-year low. those headlines make people think --

>> that's right. unemployment may be at a five-year low because five years ago we're losing 700,000 jobs a month. if you count people who have given up looking for work and people are working part time , almost 15% of our population is unemployed. that is a disaster. you can't push that aside. real median family income is going down. so the economy has got to be at the very, very top. second of all in my view, when scientists tell us that if we don't get a handle on global warming , the planet may warm by eight degrees by the end of the century with devastating consequences, of course we have to move away from fossil fuel in a dramatic way. transform our energy system. by the way, we can create jobs doing that. right now our republican friends, when you talk about want to do entilement reform, it's not entitlement reform. let's be clear. it's massive cuts in social security , medicare, veterans programs, medicaid.

>> you know their argument is that you can't just raise taxes. you have to, at some point, you have to get your fiscal house in order and that means cuts to some of these entitlement programs .

>> no it does not. when you talk about getting your fiscal house in order, that's correct, but our republican friends forget to mention that at 15.8%, revenue compared to gdp, that is the lowest percentage in 60 years. when clinton gave us a balanced budget , revenue was about 20%. we have one out of four corporations, profitable corporations not paying a nickel in taxes in america. the effective corporate tax rate today is the lowest it's been since 1972 . of course republicans want to cut social security , medicare, medicaid. but i think it is time for large corporations who are not paying a nickel in taxes to start paying their fair share .

>> i want to ask you about your vote yesterday on filibuster reform. you voted no. you don't think it goes far enough. why? and is getting something done better than nothing?

>> yeah, i think getting something done and making the senate a little more efficient is better than nothing. but at the end of the day , what the american people are saying is, we need to do work on jobs. we need to do work on global warming , on education, on deficit, but to do that now in the senate, majority doesn't rule. it requires 60 votes. nothing in the constitution about having to have 60 votes to pass a piece of legislation. the republicans have demanded hundreds of filibusters, brought forth hundreds of filibusters in recent years. i'm kind of old-fashioned. i think they should have all the time it needs to get up on the floor and state their case. i suspect minority rights . but the american people are hurting. they want action. we can't -- we cannot address the major issues if we continue to need 60 votes and the legislation yesterday did not deal with that issue.

>> senator bernie sanders , always good to have you on the program. thank you.

>> thank you.